Impeccable Blahs
by DoctorsPet
Summary: Barely surviving a crashlanding on the dying planet earth, The Doctor finds a new companion in a mongrel named TK, picking up some stray and strange hitchhikers before arriving on Gliese 581 O, a planet on the brink of disaster. Some strong language
1. Intro

Dr is a MadMan

Along the side of the highway

I became a madman.

The skin on her arm was beginning

To vaguely resemble tissue paper

Slightly crinkled but still a little soft.

As we passed the faerie mount

The rolling rise and fall amid the cattle spread

Where I wondered what fists beneath the earth

Pressed up in violent bursts between

The vast little licks of flat and green grass

All graying at the tips right down beneath the sun.

Along the side of the highway

He became a madman

Having lost all he had

Wandering right on down and by

The abrupt ripple glimmer silver

Among the faerie mount and slipped right in

Thumb jerked out at passer bys fallen under shade

But no one ever stopped.

Where he'd gone he'd long past left his machine

Broken slumped all over in a ditch

Looking out to the conical rise

Sharp like a finger cupped inside a hand

Inside another and sloping down around

Into the trees he wandered

Disheveled wonder all in converse shoes

Brown trench dusted in the earth

Black hair all awry --

Along the side of the highway

He became a madman.

Cut right through the mountain side --

And a sign hidden among the trees

Proclaimed "We are here!

'The loneliest of all creatures

in the universe' but we've plenty of highs

I'm sure I can guarantee

That even in the desert

Some weeds grow so well"

And he hung his head

Like a diamond through the glass

For where else had he left to go?

Can't you tell what song I listened to?

The hole in the ground

A swirl full of dust and cracks thirsty

Crying out for water and white moon beams

This city is full of mongrels and half-wits

Along the side of the highway

They became madmen.

How'd he even wonder to find

This girl

The one with a brain still screwed in

Twitching tail and eyes that were --

What?

Golden green rimmed and flecked

All blue and gray

She didn't believe in reservation

But in this post-apocalyptic world

It's hard to not believe in preservation

Of the self in this world of

Mongrels are better that pure-breeds.

On this side of the highway

We became madmen

And tried to dress shy to hold out the pain

So he slunk down amid the mattresses

And couches so worn

Even the rats wouldn't bother a chew

To kick up his converse heels close hi brown

Big brown eyes all rimmed in long

Long lashes and blink the dust away

As she sat down beside him

To explain

"Here I have only

The clothes on my back and the shiv in my belt."

Out across the distance she pointed to

The strong rise up out of the graying blue

Creased all the way down

Ever green

Where the waters lap lazily at red gray yellow stone

And who knows what might live way down

In the depths of the ripple and the mud puddles

Where once the trees rose out ad island

Now stands high above the dying waters

Just to look.

On the side of the highway

She almost became a madman

And just this once

Saved him instead of her.


	2. Chapter 1 to 2

Dr is a MadMan

Along the side of the highway

I became a madman.

The skin on her arm was beginning

To vaguely resemble tissue paper

Slightly crinkled but still a little soft.

As we passed the faerie mount

The rolling rise and fall amid the cattle spread

Where I wondered what fists beneath the earth

Pressed up in violent bursts between

The vast little licks of flat and green grass

All graying at the tips right down beneath the sun.

Along the side of the highway

He became a madman

Having lost all he had

Wandering right on down and by

The abrupt ripple glimmer silver

Among the faerie mount and slipped right in

Thumb jerked out at passer bys fallen under shade

But no one ever stopped.

Where he'd gone he'd long past left his machine

Broken slumped all over in a ditch

Looking out to the conical rise

Sharp like a finger cupped inside a hand

Inside another and sloping down around

Into the trees he wandered

Disheveled wonder all in converse shoes

Brown trench dusted in the earth

Black hair all awry --

Along the side of the highway

He became a madman.

Cut right through the mountain side --

And a sign hidden among the trees

Proclaimed "We are here!

'The loneliest of all creatures

in the universe' but we've plenty of highs

I'm sure I can guarantee

That even in the desert

Some weeds grow so well"

And he hung his head

Like a diamond through the glass

For where else had he left to go?

Can't you tell what song I listened to?

The hole in the ground

A swirl full of dust and cracks thirsty

Crying out for water and white moon beams

This city is full of mongrels and half-wits

Along the side of the highway

They became madmen.

How'd he even wonder to find

This girl

The one with a brain still screwed in

Twitching tail and eyes that were --

What?

Golden green rimmed and flecked

All blue and gray

She didn't believe in reservation

But in this post-apocalyptic world

It's hard to not believe in preservation

Of the self in this world of

Mongrels are better that pure-breeds.

On this side of the highway

We became madmen

And tried to dress shy to hold out the pain

So he slunk down amid the mattresses

And couches so worn

Even the rats wouldn't bother a chew

To kick up his converse heels close hi brown

Big brown eyes all rimmed in long

Long lashes and blink the dust away

As she sat down beside him

To explain

"Here I have only

The clothes on my back and the shiv in my belt."

Out across the distance she pointed to

The strong rise up out of the graying blue

Creased all the way down

Ever green

Where the waters lap lazily at red gray yellow stone

And who knows what might live way down

In the depths of the ripple and the mud puddles

Where once the trees rose out ad island

Now stands high above the dying waters

Just to look.

On the side of the highway

She almost became a madman

And just this once

Saved him instead of her.

Chapter 1

A rage of clicks and squeals filled the artificial air as the engine resting below the feet of the beings sitting behind the wheel gave out. The strange atmosphere was just too much for the fragile parts of the engine bore to all of existence by a stray piece of quickly moving space junk.

It was that terrible piece of space junk discarded by the humans that had thrown them into a death roll towards earth's atmosphere. Tearing through it had shed the ship of any protective alloy coating that had been thickly layered over the whole ship.

Now they were speeding quickly towards the hard ground, spinning wildly out of control.

At least one was already dead, thrown too hard against a wall before she could get to her seat. Her fragile skull had practically liquidated upon the force of the impact. Her _frentuak_ leaned over in his seat, grasping desperately at her limp, soft fingers, tears much like a human's streaming down his small cheeks and falling from his pointed chin.

The driver was screeching her curses, in a language made up entirely of small squeals, clicks, and clucks. She couldn't pull the ship out of its spinning nose dive, and the phantom flames roaring up from the nose of the ship struck even further fear into her. She understood, even in her brisk panic, that the engine was not on fire, that the flames were caused by the friction of the atmosphere, especially upon their initial breakthrough, but she couldn't rid herself of the fear that the engine would blow.

And then, impact.

The ship collided with the dry dirt, skidding a few hundred yard, hitting a rock which launched into the air, rolling it almost fifty feet above the earth's surface before it finally returned to the solidity of the planet's body with a crushing _slam_, finally halting.

Lifting her head from her controls, her big, oval eyes looking out through the transparent memory metal that served as a strong and protective window into the harsh reality of the world outside.

It was unlike anything she had ever seen before. The vegetation here was little and low to the ground, wiry and pale yellow, sometimes gray, patchy and sometimes completely gone, revealing the pale dirty beneath it.

Turning to look back at her crew, her eyes fell upon those dead. There was only one left alive. Just the one, shivering, clinging to the dead hand of his _frentuak_, not wanting to lift his eyes for fear that it wasn't yet over.

Calling to him, she fought her way out of her harness, telling him that they needed to get out and they needed to get out now. Shaking his head, he slumped closer to his dead mate, seemingly unwilling to accept that she was dead.

_Now!_ She shouted in her native tongue, a guttural cluck followed by a high pitched squeak as she got to her feet and walked across the slanted ground, pulling him from his harness. She commanded him to let go of her hand, that he could mourn but not until they were safely out of their dead ship.

It was battle, getting him out, getting him to put on a portable filtration system to keep their lungs working, even in this strange atmosphere.

By the time they got out, there were already strange being present - the ones the stories called "humans."

They tall stature, followed with their broad shoulders and their stern, stiff way of moving was frightening. The glint of sunlight off all of the metal pieces all over the jackets of the humans were even more intimidating, but they seemed important.

Maybe they could help.

The wreckage had been gathered and transported to a holding area deep in the mountains about three miles off from the crash site. The three dead bodies were stored in little, oblong freezers for transportation and the two living were hustled into the back of a truck alongside the crates for the dead. They were taken to the same holding place, and while the dead bodies were taken down one long hall the living were taken down another, separated and put into cold, white cells to wait to be officially detained, photographed, and studied.

They had already been photographed alongside the wreckage and the remains of their dead crew. But that was quick, pre-procedure, if you will. The following, true procedure would be much longer, much more difficult and much more frightening.

Perhaps a month later, the distress call from the now dead ship bounced off the right satellite. It reached the appropriate ears, it got to the right beings. Information was dug up, research was done. It was discovered that upon crash-landing on planet earth, one hundred and thirty four out of one hundred and thirty four civilian space travelers never returned, and fifty eight non-civilians were never even heard from again.

Vivian 'Viv' Quasidjinn of Opebocar Delta was sent in. She, after all, was mostly human, as far as genetics go. She was also crazier than the other bounty hunters available, and therefore the best choice.

The head of the military base had rounded the corner, sipping his coffee. Upon the sudden appearance of an unauthorized individual on the top-secret government base, he spilled his coffee all over his nice pressed uniform.

Viv smiled with her mildly lopsided, full lips, her slightly slanty blue eyes shimmering as she lifted a hand in which she held a thick yet lightweight gun which still managed to be heavy duty. "Hello Logan Hedger, you are under arrest for - oh, you know what? Fuck it. You wont have any idea what I'm saying anyway." Rolling her eyes, she sighed, blowing a stray strand of dark blonde hair out of her vision. "You're under arrest for what is this solar system's interplanetary version of crimes against humanity, OK?"

"Who the fuck are you and how did you get into this base?"

"Oh, I'm so sorry," she said with a smile. "How impolite - my name is Vivian 'Viv' Quasidjinn of Opebocar Delta. I am here to take you back to my current boss and received the rather large bounty now placed on your head. If you try to resist I will kill you, but if you come nicely, you'll get a cookie."

Chapter 2

It had surprised the Doctor how easily a jingsawl gear had been to find on the dying earth, and how easily TK had been able to show him to one. It had also been a surprise to find the earth in its current condition.

"So," TK murmured, hopping a step or two in front of the Doctor, her long, silvery brown hair swinging around her waist as she spun to face him with a smile as she swung her cat talk playfully back and forth around her legs. "You never said - do you have room on board for one lonely mongrel?"

Lifting his eyes to hers, for a moment observing her eyes and wondering if the array of color in them was a result of a deeply mixed genetic background or if they would have occurred had she been a pure-bread human, as well. "I have room for one if you would like to tag along."

"I would like nothing better," she said, smiling broadly, her eyes crinkling as she spun around to continue toward the big, blue box sitting crooked in the ditch, buried at least three feet into the drying mud.

"You should know, it can sometimes be dangerous," he said.

"Psh," she laughed, waving a hand at him. "Dangerous is better than slowly dying from a badly poisoned atmosphere."

"If you look at it that way, then," the Doctor murmured, catching up with TK as she reached the TARDIS, slipping his hand into his now thoroughly dust-ridden jacket for the key. Opening the door, he pushed it open and, about to step in, jumped back. "What - who are you? How did you get into my ship?"

Inside, leaning against one of the TARDIS's internal arches, a girl smiled, arms crossed over her black, rubber top, her arms covered with black tattoos, designs from cultures across the universe. Her dark blonde hair, pulled back into a pony tail, bounced slightly as she leaned forward, uncrossing her arms and slipping from the arch onto the crooked floor. "My name is Viv, I'm a bounty hunter and I am here for you." She lifted a finger to TK.

Turning to TK, the Doctor frowned, his brown eyes still a little widened from the shock of finding a stranger in his machine. "What did you do?" Shaking his head, he turned back to Viv, squinting slightly at her. "How did you get into my ship?"

"I have my ways," she said with a shrug, her blue eyes flicking to the Doctor for a moment, before turning back to TK. "You have a nice bounty on your head, I'm supposed to come get you."

"What did you do?" The Doctor squeaked, turning and looking at TK again as she stepped back slightly.

"Who the hell has a bounty on me?"

"Delta Scorpii with the Plutocratic Territories, of the planet Cefoga," she said with a little shrug. "And, good Sir, your friend stole a rather large wad of Tora Nexus from the remains of what was the American government."

"It was kind of like a cure-all for humans," TK said.

"Yeah, I know what Tora Nexus is," the Doctor said. "An alien planet the American government took from a crash alien space ship in 1945, they grew it in secret but someone in the station snuck it out after discovering it's healing properties - it could cure the common cold and even reduce cancerous tumors, reducing them to non-malignant lumps - as it got to all the nations of the world the economy became dependent on it, when it began to die the world economy basically imploded-" Turning to TK, lifting his eyebrows, the Doctor asked: "You stole some of it? How?"

She gave a little shrug. "I have my ways."

"What's your name again?" He asked, turning back to Viv.

"Vivian Quasidjinn of Opebocar Delta," Viv said proudly. "Everyone calls me Viv."

"Opebocar Delta is a dead planet," the Doctor said, confusion still scrawled across his features. "It died ages ago."

"What year is it now?" Viv asked, squinting slightly as she scrunched up her nose. "I've got a bad memory."

"It's 3456," KT said.

"Right," Viv said with an exaggerated nod. "Then it did die ages ago! Huh..."

"How did you get here?" The Doctor asked.

"A good friend of mine," Viv said, smiling, holding her hands behind her back,, swaying slightly back and forth, looking like a schoolgirl with a crush. "I believe you know 'im - name's Captain Jack Harkness."

Brow relaxing, the Doctor rolled his eyes. "Of course," he muttered. "What did he give you?"

Lifting her left wrist, she flashed what looked like a thick black cuff with the face of a watch stuck to the inside of the wrist. "Let's me jump time."

"Yeah, I know," the Doctor said. "I should take that from you right now."

"That wouldn't be very nice, now wou-"

A crack of metal against metal shattered through the air, sending golden sparks spattering down over the Doctor and TK as they jumped, instinctively ducking slightly as they turned, searching for what had caused the sudden burst.

"O...K," Viv said, "kinda forgot to mention that I'm being trailed. You should probably get in here now." 

"Trailed by who?" TK snapped, jumping into the TARDIS, her eyes widening as she realize the large interior of the machine in contrast to the small appearance of the outside. "What the-"

Pulling the doors shut, the Doctor locked them, turning to Viv. "You didn't break them, did you?" 

"No," she said, shaking her head.

"Good." He ran past TK to the pillar of controls in the center of the room, holding a hand out to TK. "Give me the gear!"

She tossed it to him, and as he snatched it out of the air, ripping into a panel to replace the broken gear, she turned to Viv. "How much is the bounty?"

Another crack sounded outside, this time against the door.

"Fifty thousand killions," Viv said.

"Psh," TK snorted, scrunching up her nose. "I'm worth more than fifty thousand _killions_."

"Yeah," Viv said, lifting an eyebrow. "Now I'm thinking maybe a couple hundred filtrens."

"Come on, come one," the Doctor murmured, having shoved the gear into place, twisting dials and flicking switches on the control panel. "Come on!"

Turning, TK ran up beside the Doctor, lifting a hard fist, bringing it down on top of the control panel. The TARDIS whirred to life as the group outside attacked the door, firing shot after shot into the handles and into the crack between the door. The TARDIS, however, held strong, and soon left the angry men behind.

Jumping back, the Doctor punched the air triumphantly. "YES!" He shouted, turning to TK.

"The...It lives!" She said, lifting her hands triumphantly into the air.

Attacking her with a tight hug, the Doctor lifted her into a spin, practically tripping and falling over his own two feet as he returned her to the ground. "The _TARDIS _always pulls through," he laughed, stepping to the control panel, patting it tenderly where TK had struck it. "Hm..."

Clearing her throat, the momentarily forgotten Viv placed her hands sternly on her hips, lifting an eyebrow. "Sorry to break up the party, but I've got to take you back for my bounty," she said to TK.

Turning, TK frowned, shaking her head slowly. "I don't think so."

"Oh, come on," TK said, lifting her wrist, turning the dial on the cuff. "It's not so bad - they'll probably only keep you for a year or so."

"For some stolen Tora Nexus pores?" the Doctor hissed.

"More like a wad of roots and two wads of leaves," TK said quietly. "But the point is moot. I'm not going."

Frowning, Viv tapped the dial on her cuff. "Goddamn it."

Lifting his eyebrows, the Doctor rocked up on his toes, peering at the cuff. "Not working?"

"Not even...it won't turn any further." Sticking out a pouting lower lip, she pressed the little knob beside the dial. "It's not working anymore."

"I could take you back to Torchwood and drop you off at the doors, if you would like," the Doctor murmured in suggestion.

Shaking her head, frowning, Viv tried again to turn the dial further. "I kind of...Jack didn't really _give_ this to me, persay..."

"You stole a faulty time transporty thing?" TK asked. "Really? You stole a faulty one?"

"It looked brand new," she said.

"Are you sure Jack didn't put it on his bed stand fully aware you were going to steal from him?"

"It wasn't on his bed stand," she murmured, flicking the dial. "It was his underwear drawer."

"He wears underwear?" Closing his eyes, shaking his head, the Doctor continued to say: "Never mind, I don't want to know."

Sighing, lowering her wrist, Viv looked from TK to the Doctor. "I'll be useful if you ever lock yourself out."

"Are you asking to come with us?" The Doctor asked.

"You came to arrest me," TK said. "Now you want to bunk with us?"

"I don't really have anywhere else to go," she murmured. "I don't have anything against you, I just need money. I haven't gotten anything since I arrested that army guy who kidnapped and unlawfully held the beings from the 1945 crash."

"That was you?" The Doctor asked.

"Yeah," Viv said, brightening up at the recognition. "That was me." 

"How odd..."

"You're not going to let her stay, are you?" TK asked, frowning up at the Doctor.

"I didn't say anything," he said, turning to look at TK and then back to Viv. "I don't know."

"I can be helpful, I promise," she said. "And I'm not mean or anything," Viv said, turning her eyes now to TK. "I promise. I just - I don't have anywhere to go in this century. No one in this century likes me much."

Sighing, TK lifted an eyebrow, turning to look up at the Doctor. "I guess it's your ship."


	3. Chapter 3 to 4

Chapter 3

"No one needs a closet this big," TK murmured, looking into the massive room containing clothes from all eras and all planets the verse. "This is insanity."

"It's useful," he said, hands deep in his pockets as he looked down the length of clothes hanging above folded pants above shelves of shoes. "Feel free to use whatever you like."

Her eyes turned down to his feet, clad in converse. "Do you have any more converse? I never could find any in good enough shape to stay on my feet."

"Yeah," he said, motioning into the closet. "Somewhere in there."

Moving down the rows a little, TK shuffled through the shoes, beaming as she pulled out a pair of green converse.

"The bounty hunter asked me if I would drop her off," he said. "Turns out dropping her off means dropping her off with you in tow, cuffs and all."

"It's been a long time since I've seen so many tattoos that weren't shaky and worn," TK muttered, pulling the converse on, wiggling her toes inside the shoes as she laced them up, springing her feet to go searching through the jackets.

"Those tattoos are from all across the universe," the Doctor murmured, frowning slightly. "All different times. They're all like a big mush of cultural symbols that mean absolute gibberish together."

"Maybe because she's gibberish," TK suggested, pulling on a heavy and worn patch-work jacket that smelled of mothballs.

"The only one that doesn't seem to fit specifically to any culture or any race is the band on her right arm," he said thoughtfully, sticking his chin out slightly, his eyes narrowed on the grated floor. "It's also the least professional...probably the first one."

"Does it matter?" TK asked, curling up inside of her newly chosen jacket, her tail curling up and twitching happily. A jacket like this would mark a king where she came from.

"Just trying to figure out who our hitch hiker is..."

"What's a tattoo gonna tell you?"

"A lot if it's covering up another tattoo."

"What?" TK asked. "Like a registration number or something? That's like Concentration camp stuff."

"Just as concentration camps never were specific to Nazi Germany they aren't a practice kept solely to planet earth," he said, lifting his eyes to TK, raising an eyebrow. "It's entirely understandable that someone would want to cover up such a mark."

"But where would it have come from?"

"Opebocar Delta," The Doctor said, pushing away from the wall as his eyes widened slightly. "Opebocar Delta!"

"What?" TK asked, scrunching up her nose slightly as she stared at him from down the closet

hallway.

Spinning on his heels, the Doctor skipped out and into the console room.

Viv was sitting on the ramp before the door, feeling her hair. It had been chopped short, and the discarded locks lay about on the floor around her.

Frowning, the Doctor approached, slowing to take notice of the hair strewn about the floor of his TARDIS. "What is this?" He snapped, motioning to the hair.

Turning around and looking up at him, Viv smiled big and bright. "Do you like it?"

"You made a mess!"

"I'll clean it up," she said, fluffing her short an choppy hair, only a couple of inches long save near her ears and eyes, where it was three, maybe four inches at the longest. "But is it cute? I don't know if you keep a mirror. Not that it matters - I haven't seen a reflection of myself except in muddy liquids for years-"

Waving a hand briskly through the air, the Doctor closed his eyes, bowing his head slightly. "You said you are from Opebocar Delta?" He murmured. "Opebocar Delta was a planet for genetic experiments and scientific breakthroughs, not for families."

"Yeah, so?" She muttered, getting to her feet, brushing stray strands of hair from her shoulders.

Lifting and opening his eyes, the Doctor let them narrow on Viv. "How did you even cut it?"

"Handy-Dandy-Pocket-Knife," she said in a girlish voice, giving a little grin.

Shaking his head again, the Doctor turned to follow her with his eyes as she walked around the control board in the center of the room, staring up the glowing column rising from the middle of the switchboards. "The scientists who worked there lived on the moons," he said. "No one _lived_ on Opebocar Delta."

"What is this machine exactly?" She murmured, squinting up the column, standing with her hands folded behind her back, military-fashion.

"You managed to break in without even knowing what it was?" TK asked, coming out from the closet room, bundled up in her new coat and green converse. "You entertain me."

"I know it's a TARDIS," Viv said softly. "I've heard passing rumors of a TARDIS in the past, but never really knew what they were. I honestly didn't believe in them either, until I got inside this one, that is. Once you're inside of something, how can you disbelieve it?" She laughed. "If you got ate by a bigfoot wouldn't you believe?"

"Bigfoot?" TK asked, lifting a curious eyebrow.

"You would know them as Homo Erectus Archaic," the Doctor said, moving towards Viv. "TARDIS stands for Time And Relative Dimension or Dimensions In Space," the Doctor said. "That's what it does - it kind of hops times and space, like a frog..." He gave something of a shrug. "It's not so much a machine, though...something that can be hard to understand - but that's beside the point, anyway."

"What is the point, Doctor?" Viv asked, lowering her eyes evenly to his. "Why is it so important for you to know where I originated and less important to be aware of the fact that I am now _here_?"

Brow creasing, the Doctor scrunched his nose slightly as he examined her. He opened his mouth to speak, but just as the words formed on his tongue the TARDIS became jittery, and shaking and knocking them all to the floor.

"What's happening?" TK shouted, pushing herself up, trying to steady herself as she became gradually dizzy, as though she were spinning faster and faster and just couldn't stop herself.

Climbing to his feet, the Doctor lunged at the control panels, almost tripping over Viv as she clung to mesh paneling of the floor, eyes slammed shut in effort to not loose her stomach.

"I don't know!" The Doctor said, grabbing levers, pressing buttons and turning knobs seemingly at random, beating the paneling with an open palm as the TARDIS quivered and creaked. "But we're spinning out of control!"

Chapter 4

The crash thundered throughout the ship, sending drinks sloshing off the table and onto the riveted steel floor and meals flying. Children fell off their stools and mothers scrambled to catch their babies before the highchairs toppled in the wake of the rippling chaos. Bells jingled as the gypsy women leapt from their seats and the men clamored to remain on their feet or in their chairs.

As a second _bang_ followed the first, much larger one, the ship quivered again. The girl at the head of the horde flung out her toned arms, catching herself on the walls as the ground shuddered, wanting to ripple and vanish beneath her bare feet. Her long, wavering, dark hair fell across her face as she continued forward, releasing the walls once the ground had solidified again.

Flinging her hair back, revealing her deep, dark eyes, small crescent moon framing the bottom corner of the left eye, she ran into the storage room, from where the crash seemed to have emanated from.

Throwing open the door, jingling skirt wavering around her ankles, the girl looked in upon a strange sight.

Several wooden carts were crushed beneath the weight of a big, blue box, keeping it slightly propped up on one of it's bottom edges. Frowning, she stepped into the room, followed by an ever growing group of men and women curious as to what had invaded their ship without shredding it's protective walls.

One the side facing the ceiling, a door flung open and a man peered out, his dark hair a mess as he glanced about with big, brown eyes. "Well, then," he murmured. "The TARDIS is just having all sorts of problems this month."

"Um, excuse me?" The girl said loudly, stepping gingerly forward. "Who the hell are you?"

Turning his eyes to the girl and the crowd at her back, he lifted his eyebrows, giving a big, friendly smile. "Hello. Um, sorry about the intrusion." Bracing himself on the edge of the door frame, he hauled himself out and slid down onto the floor, brushing some dust off of his pinstripe suit as a heavily tattooed woman followed, helping another girl from the strange blue box. "I'm The Doctor," he said, approaching, glancing about. "Really sorry about this, I don't know what's happening. This is the second crash landing I've inadvertently made in two weeks."

Arching her neck to the side, the girl frowned curiously at the two women sliding down onto the floor. "And you?" She asked.

The one with the bushy brown tail turned, pretty eyes wide as they fell on the gypsy girl. "I'm TK. I just joined up."

"Hi," the girl with the tattoos waved and smiled girlishly. "I'm Viv. I broke in and now I'm stuck."

"Uh-huh." Turning her attention back to the man calling himself "Doctor," she gave another curious frown, scrunching up her softly freckled nose, her dark hair falling down around her shoulders in stark contrast to her pale skin. "Doctor?"

"Yup," he sad, shoving his hands into his pockets, rolling onto the balls of his feet. "That would be me."

"What's that box there?" She asked. "That's not a ship, is it?"

"Well," he murmured, "actually it is. It's the TARDIS."

"I don't follow."

"Time And Relative Dimensions In Space," he said shortly. "The name's not so important as the fact that she seems to be very badly broken."

"That's a ship?" The girl asked skeptically, pointing to the blue box as the two females approached.

"I assure you, it's much bigger on the inside." Pausing, he squinted slightly down at her. "What was your name again?"

"Kalimata," she said quickly, turning her eyes back to the ship.

"Is there any chance that you might have some spare parts lying around?" The Doctor asked. "I...I don't know what's wrong with it, persay - but we can always find out."

"Yeah," she said slowly. "But I wouldn't know about that." Turning, she pointing to a man in a loose fitting, white t-shirt. "That's Baldy. Talk to him."

Since Rose, no companion had stayed long. A year, at the most. Some barely stayed a week. He'd gone through companions, constantly burning candles, and wondered if any would ever stay and be quite as brilliant as Rose had been.

Martha had been amazing, as well. She had stayed the longest out of all of them. But she was no Rose. Rose had, after all, absorbed the time vortex.

The TARDIS remembered Rose, as well. It made it hard for him to forget her. Memories of her flickered in the control panels, under the grating floor, among the fabrics in the closet. On occasion he thought he saw her out of the corner of his eye, but it was never anything more than a blinking light or a shadow.

He'd left a lot of companions behind, and many had left him behind. Sometimes it wasn't so bad. Other times it felt like nothing could replace what he'd just let go of. But something always came along and did. Still, he couldn't help but wonder if ever anything would come along and replace Rose. It felt less like he had let her go, more like she had been torn from his grasping fingers.

Shaking off the abrupt feeling, the Doctor turned his eyes down to the plate set before him. The group had insisted that their "guests" eat with them. It was a holiday of some sort, and the air had returned to the joyous, warm feeling that had been shaken with the crash landing of the TARDIS.

The plate was piled high with vegetables, rice and lentils, tofu and fruits. He dug in, grateful for the easily come-by food and generosity of their hosts after all the fits the TARDIS had been throwing.

Beside him say TK, poking curiously at her tofu, dripping with a yellowish sauce. She finally dug in,, closing her eyes thoughtfully before giving a little "mm" and a shrug, shoveling more food into her mouth. It had probably been months since she'd last had such a large and fresh meal. Beside her sat Viv, stuffing her face as well, talking through mouthfuls to Kalimata about the people on board.

"We are called St'avatem," Kalimata said, lifting a fork-full of garlicy lentils to her lips. "It means Star People. It originated from the name Bavaltem, People of the Wind. As we started climbing from earth's atmosphere, the name just kind of evolved."

"That's really cool," she said. "I like how that sounds - is it from a specific language, or...?"

"Yes, it's from the language of the Romanie," Kalimata said through her lentils with a nod. "St'avatem used to be Romanie, millennia ago. We kind of branched off and did our own kind of thing. As it became a culture of it's own it evolved, to the point where the only thing recognizable as Romanie anymore is the dress and the words, on occasion. Women are much more in power here, though there is a tendency towards equality among the sexes. The religion has evolved, as well. Whereas the Romanie religion was something of an evolution of old Indian religions on earth, tossed about with other religions the tribe encountered in their travels, the religion we follow is a matriarchal evolution of various pagan and Christian religions just kind of slapped together." She put her fork down, lifting her hands and bringing them sharply together. "It's pretty fun."

"Did you hear that, Doctor?" TK said as she swallowed a huge mouthful. "That sounds cool."

"Yeah," he said, nodding as he ate some of the lentils. They really were delicious, drenched in the taste of garlic, fresh basil and oregano. It was very earthy meal, but it was fantastic. "I've encountered St'avatem on occasion," he said. "Not often, though - they usually keep to themselves."

"Well, we certainty wouldn't have just invited you on board," Kalimata said. "You had to just crash in our supplies room. How does that ship of yours work, anyway?"

"It kind of uses a type of ripple in time - it's kind of like what you humans like to call a 'wormhole,' but much more stable than the kind of wormhole Einstein's laws of general relativity would allow for. It uses these 'holes' punched through the ripples of times to jump around - most people of time as being a straight line, but it's really not at all. It's more a mesh of a bunch of stuff on an eternal grid, only the grid is three-dimension and kind of lumpy like." He gave a shrug, digging back into his meal. "When you understand the basic principals of how space and time collide it's a fairly easy concept to grasp."

TK, Kalimata and Viv all exchanged glances, giving a little shrug before returning to their meals.

There was music on the air, rippling and ancient-sounding, like something to play alongside old ceremonial fires, music to be danced along to. As the music began to grow stronger, men and women began to wander from their meals, forming a semi-circle in the middle of the room, playing guitars, flutes, and little drums held between their knees. The air grew stronger and stronger, until it seemed Kalimata could no longer stay seated.

Rising to her feet, Kamilata swayed into the middle of the semi-circle, lifting her hands into a rhythmic clap, urging the others to keep time with their hands as she began to dance, her hips wavering from side to side, her belly rippling with the expert diaphragm control of a long time belly dancer. Her arms were like snakes at her side, writhing out as though they had their identities as she spun, her skirts flying up and out like a bell.

"Oh." Viv murmured, her eyes widening slightly as she watched Kalimata.

Soon, others were joining. Viv got up and ran out to Kalimata, pleading to be taught just how to do that.

TK had finished up her meal and now sat watching with fascination the dancing of the people as they rose from their empty plates, women, men, and children. Those remaining on the sidelines kept time with their hands, the clapping sliding rhythmically along with the music.

"I don't suppose you know how to dance?" TK asked, looking up at the Doctor.

As he turned his eyes back towards her, she gave a perky little grin, her big eyes flashing with the array of colors held prisoner within them. "No," he said. "I don't really know how to dance."

"Oh, come on," TK said, standing, grabbing his hand and pulling him to his feet. "All this time that you've been alive and traveling and you never learned how to dance?"

"Well, I've been busy saving the entirety of existence," he said with a shrug. "I just never had the time."

"Somehow, I don't believe you," TK said with a smile, yanking him away from the table and out into the semi-circle of musicians and dancers, family, friends and lovers.

"I don't know how to dance like _this_!" The Doctor protested, looking around, panicky as he saw the people dancing together, no space left between their bodies. His eyes found Viv and Kalimata, dancing so close the curve of their hips seemed lost in the carefully choreographed dance. "I've never dance like this before!"

"Then teach me how to dance the way you dance," she said, smiling, taking one of his hands in hers, placing his other on her hip. "I'm assuming you're going to go all ball-room on me."

Swallowing thickly, he tightened his fingers on her hand, nodded as she lifted her free hand to his shoulder, and he turned, pulling her gently along, following their hands, bent slightly out to the side, and they went spin-skipping among the writhing bodies on the dance floor. A brief second pulled the memory of dancing with Rose into his mind, and he quickly let it vanish as TK threw her head back in happy laughter. It was contagious. He felt his eyes crinkle as a smile broke across his face, and he danced around with her until their knees threatened to buckle.


	4. Chapter 5

I supposed that I should probably do this thing: I do not own, in part or in whole, Doctor Who or any of the Doctor Who characters which the BBC writers for the show have created, including but not limited to The Doctor, Rose, Captain Jack, Martha, and the Daleks. I do however, own the characters of Viv, TK, Kalimata, Joel, and the Gorphins.

* * *

Chapter 5

"How did we pick up _another_ hitchhiker?" The Doctor whispered loudly in a back room. "I am telling you, we need to just take her and drop her at Torchwood. It doesn't sound like Jack would be entirely opposed to the idea."

"Now you're just being mean," TK said, putting her long hair up into a sloppy bun at the back of her head.

"Barely a day ago she was trying to arrest you," the Doctor said.

"People deserve second chances."

"Well…" He murmured softly, bowing his head slightly. "Yeah. But we don't know if she's a person," the Doctor said. "We don't know anything about her, except that she managed to break into the TARDIS." Leaning back against the wall, the Doctor lifted his hands to his hair, pushing his fingers through, scruffing it up a bit. "We'll be a caravan soon."

"Don't be sad, Doctor," TK said, turning to him, lifting her eyebrows a bit, sticking out a pouting lower lip.

"I'm not sad."

"Don't be angry, Doctor."

"I'm not angry."

"Well then, what are you? A radioactive rabbit?"

"What? No - I just…am."

"Hm," TK murmured, turning back towards the sink and mirror. Bending down, holding her hands under the faucet, TK gathered a pool of icy water and splashed it over her face. It was something she would do every night before heading off to bed.

"It's just that there are weird things about her," he murmured.

"There are weird things about everyone," TK said, drying her face on her shirt. "I have a tail, for instance. She has tattoos."

"You were born with a tail."

"So?"

"I'm not entirely sure that I understand why someone would want to mark themselves up like that," he said, a slight frown crossing his features.

"Something the Doctor doesn't understand?" TK teased. "Oh..."

"You're picking on me." The Doctor turned and walked out of the little washroom, winding his way to the console room.

Sitting on the ground near the control panels, Viv and Kalimata sat talking in quick whispers.

"Hey, kids," the Doctor said, approaching the control panels.

"Yo," Viv said, giving him an exaggerated head nod as Kalimata looked up at him.

"Where can I take you?" He asked, looking to Kalimata.

"You want to get rid of me so soon?"

"Well-"

"I always hoped to see Granbar b," she said. "That's kind of my aim."

"Granbar b," he muttered, turning to the controls. "Easy."

"Why did you want to leave, anyway?" Viv asked.

"Bored."

"Ah."

TK came out, shaking her hair down out of its bun as the TARDIS roared into action, repaired once again. "Where are we going?"

"A place called Granbar b," the Doctor said. "Last time I was there it was a bit out of shape, but I imagine that it's back up and running."

As the TARDIS gave a little shudder, the Doctor tensed, his eyes rolling up to the tall column, glowing with life as the TARDIS went spinning through time and space towards Granbar b. _Please do not do this again, please do not throw another fit_.

"That didn't feel good," TK muttered, looking up at the column.

"Let's cross our fingers and hope it doesn't happen again," he said softly in reply, reaching up to place his palm against the warm column. It felt as though it wanted to over heat. "No more fits, baby. It's OK."

"Did you just call your machine 'baby'?" Kalimata asked with a laugh.

Disregarding her comment, the Doctor pulled his hand back from the column as the TARDIS landed.

"OK, off my ship!" He hollered, lifting his arms abruptly into the air, marching towards the door. "The TARDIS needs a moment - off everybody!"

Getting to their feet, Viv and Kalimata pushed open the doors, stepping into the icy air, the wind whipping about the dead looking city.

"Oh my," the Doctor said as he stepped out of the TARDIS, KT directly behind him. "That's not good."

"What happened here?" KT murmured, looking up at the skeletal framework of the crumbling city.

"This planet had a harder time getting to her feet than I thought she would," the Doctor said, bypassing Viv and Kalimata, walking down the cracked and littered street, hands shoved thoughtfully into his pockets, gazing up at the sharp remains standing against the dusk sky.

"Not as exciting as I was hoping it might be," Kalimata muttered, arm hopped around Viv's as they wandered after TK and the Doctor.

"The last time I was here a dictator called Ruthleorn had fought to control of the _entire planet_," he said. "As usual, I swept in and brilliantly saved the day with my companion, who wanted to go home the next day, but that's beside the point - he was gone, banished into the vastness of space far from here." He frowned curiously around, turning on his heels to get a three-sixty view of the apparent ghost city. "Even if he had returned, this is much worse than the damage he'd originally afflicted."

"Someone else?" TK asked, shrugging her shoulders, hugging her thick coat against the cold. "When this Ruthleorn guy was gone, they saw an opportunity to wreak havoc?"

"Maybe," he murmured. "This is the work of a massive group, though," he said. "Too much destruction for just one person, or even a gang. This is an almost military destruction - nothing left."

"Not quite nothing."

Spinning to face the voice, the ground was faced with a figure clad in skin-tight black armor which was pulled down over their face, making them almost invisible among the shadows the cities wreckage. The gun in their hand, propped against their shoulder, was the only thing that wasn't black like the background, but rather silver and gleaming in the remaining light.

"Whoa," the Doctor said, holding his hands up. "No need for guns. We came by to visit the planet, thinking it would have found it's old glory by now."

"As you can see, it hasn't," the figure snarled. "Who are you?"

"I'm the Doctor, this is my companion TK, and those two I don't really know. They just kind of jumped on my ship."

"Hey," Viv hissed, turning to shoot the Doctor a vicious glare, to which he only responded with a shrug.

"What happened here?" The Doctor asked, keeping his hands in the air so long as the figure kept the gun trained firmly on him and his group.

"Some fucking miscreants cats off of your precious earth, _human_," the figure spat. "Call themselves _Elective State_." The figure gave a little snort. "Elective my ass."

"You say they came from earth?" The Doctor murmured. "What year is it?"

"Don't you know, Doctor?" The figure bit out.

The Doctor could see the figure's muscles shifting under the armor. Whatever that armor was, it was military-grade, probably as flexible as plastic and was pulled over the body like a wet suit. "Well, sometimes my ship throws us off course a bit," he said. "Been acting up - you know how ships can be."

"Actually, no," the figure snapped. "My ship was confiscated. I can't seem to recall."

"Listen," the Doctor said softly. "If you'll lower the gun a bit, we're entirely willing to help you out. Take us to the building where this Elective State is, tell us what year it is, and we'll get it all figured out."

"Glad we're so helpful," Kalimata muttered.

"It's 3027," the figure said, relaxing their grip on the gun slightly.

"That's the year earth was abandoned," TK said softly, lifting her eyes to the Doctor, who stood staring at the figure thoughtfully. "The governments and anyone with money just took off, left the 'lower classes' all there."

Lifting his chin slightly, the Doctor let out a soft breath. "Mind telling us exactly what happened here?"

"They landed in this city," the figure said. "They came out guns blazing, wiping out everything. Well...almost. A couple of us got away. We heard how they had used the city as an example, and any other city that tried to rebel was taken down, as well."

"Humans can be such vicious apes," the Doctor muttered, lowering his hands. "Mind showing us to the headquarters?"

"Find it yourself," the figure said, dropping the gun to the side. "It's in the city square. 'Bout a block from here. You'll know it as soon as you see it."

The figure melted into the shadows, abruptly vanished.

"What was that?" TK asked, staring into the space the figure had occupied seconds before.

"They're called Krshorsaque," the Doctor said. "They're usually fairly nice..." Turning, taking a little silver stick with a blue, glowing tip and holding it out in front of him.

"Are you sure we should do this?" Kalimata asked. "Is it any of our business?"

"Humans aren't supposed to be on this planet," the Doctor murmured. "They're destroying it, and if they stay they'll destroy this race, as well." Chewing his lower lip a moment, he cast his eyes about in the darkness. "I'm not especially fond of letting genocide happen, especially when it would be so easy to put to a stop."

"You're not just going to convince them to leave," Kalimata said. "People may be weak of body, but they are stubborn as all hell."

"I'll ask them first," he said. "And if they decline, I have a bounty hunter and a thief on my side," he said, taking a moment to beam at TK and Viv. "I'm sure they can tamper just enough with the ship to show them that we are serious. It'll be the easiest thing I've ever done."

"Knock on wood," TK said softly.

"This way," he said, turning on the item in his hand and shoving it back into his jacket, starting off in the direction his device had told him to go.

The figure has been right. The headquarters were hard to miss.

Right in the middle of the city square sat a large, unmistakably human craft designed for breaking through an atmosphere rather than doing heavy traveling through space. There were a few windows for travelers to look out of while in the sky, but the radiation shields had been thrown up, making it impossible to tell if anyone was currently inside.

"OK," the Doctor said. "Kalimata, you are the only pure bread human here," he said. "No offense or anything - but TK, these people don't sound like the kind of people who would take kindly to other people who happen to have cat tails."

"Understood."

"And I have to many freaky tattoos," Viv said, giving him a wink and thumbs up. "Got it."

"I know you can do remarkable things when it comes to machinery," he said, pointing at Viv, then turning to TK. "And you?"

"How do you think I got into a military base to steal Tora Nexus?" TK asked, lifting an eyebrow.

"Right," the Doctor said, turning to Kalimata. "You're coming with me."

"They'll be more friendly towards the more normal, human-looking ones," she said, nodding.

"Yes," he said, turning to TK. "Do your magic."

TK gave a sharp nod, heading off towards the ship, rounding around the backside while the Doctor and Kalimata headed towards the door.

"Just to let you know I have an anti-social personality and I have another identity that is a dog that likes to bite people."

Turning quickly to Kalimata, the Doctor's eyes narrowing, unsure of how to take this.

"Just kidding," Kalimata laughed. "You're too easy."

"I'm a bit on edge," the Doctor said. "I seem to be collecting passengers and I'm not entirely sure how."

"So what are we going to do?" Kalimata asked. "Just knock on the door?"

"Yup," the Doctor said, walking right up to the door and lifting his fists against the radiation-shielded door. It didn't take much to make a ruckus and let anyone inside know that someone wanted in. It also didn't take long for someone to respond.

The door was yanked open by a man in clothes which appeared about to fall apart at the seams, who hadn't shaved in at least three days. His hair had grown down around his ears, dark and slightly curly. For a moment he just paused, staring at the strange smiling man standing before him and the gypsy girl with her long, dark hair, rugged skirts and crescent moon eye-tattoo.

His full lips parted a moment as he looked between them, his strong brow creasing. "Who...who are you?"

"Uh...Well, I'm the Doctor, and this is Kalimata."

"Hi."

"Doctor who?"

"Yeah, that's right," he said with a broad smile and a nod. "Who owns this wreck?"

"Uh..." He half motioned behind him, his dark, confused eyes remaining on the Doctor. "In the console room. How did you get here? I thought the only humans on this planet came on this ship."

"Well, I'm not human, but don't tell them that," the Doctor said.

"I'm human," Kalimata said. "I just hitched a ride with him."

"We're mostly interested in why the city has fallen into ruins."

"Well...I'll go get them for you-"

"Do you think we could come in?" Kalimata asked.

"It is rather chilly out here."

Nodding, he chewed his lower lip, thinking a moment. "I have to ask first..."

"Do you know why it's so cold?" The Doctor asked. "I'm just curious, you see, the last time I was here the coldest it got was about twenty Celsius. But right now, it can't be more than zero."

Swallowing thickly, the man nodded, lowering his voice as he spoke. "They clouded the atmosphere."

"How?"

"Bombs," he said with a shrug. "Bombs, burning factories - the sun is entirely blocked out."

"What's your name?" The Doctor asked.

"Joel," he murmured.

"Are you Jewish?" Kalimata asked softly. "Does your name mean something like 'YHWH is God'?"

His eyes turned to her, and slowly he nodded. "Something like that...I've heard, anyway."

"They're still shitting on your people?" She asked. "Those mother fuckers."

"Hey," the Doctor hissed.

"What?" She snapped. "Look at his clothes!" She motioned to him, and in response, Joel looked down at himself, suddenly embarrassed.

"Sorry about her-" The Doctor attempted.

"Don't apologize for me," Kalimata snapped, turning to Joel, seeing the blush in his tan features. "I'm sorry, I just meant that they are obviously treating you like some sort of slave or something. I bet they're sitting in there on some sort of fucking golden throne."

"Are you sure you don't have an anti-social personality?" The Doctor snapped.

"It's not my fault that rich pigs always take classes of people and shove them into these supposed 'races' and pick and chose who they're going to demean and use each generation."

"Not all-"

"Well obvious these ass holes do," Kalimata snapped, turning abruptly to Joel, flashing a sweet little smile. "Sorry about that."

"That's...fine."

"If we could come in, it would be nice," the Doctor said, shivering a little himself.

"I'll ask," Joel said, stepping back from the door and closing it.

Turning to Kalimata, the Doctor gave her a vicious little frown. "I will leave you here."

"What?" She asked, giving an innocent little shrug.

_All the patience has been drowned slowly out of me_, the Doctor thought, closing his eyes.

He could remember once, before this face, Rose and he had encountered a Dalek imprisoned in a rich man's museum of alien collections. She had touched the creature, inadvertently giving it strength...and humanity. He'd been quick to want to destroy the creature, rather than letting it die peacefully, seeing the sun at last, after long years of imprisonment. She had yelled at him, forced him to stand down.

Hugging herself against the cold, Kalimata kicked the make-shift wooden step before the door. "Sorry."

"No," he murmured. "Nothing to apologize...well...nothing much."

A little snort of laughter escaped her lips a moment before the door opened wide and warm air swept across them, the light blocked out by a tall woman dressed up in a kimono-styled dress, her hair done up like an ancient earth queen.

"Who are you?" She demanded, looking down on them with small eyes and pinched lips.

"Ow," TK hissed, stubbing her toe in the dark chute through which they were climbing to find the wiring hidden in the walls.

"You OK?" Viv asked, arching her back up to look down between her legs at TK, several steps behind so Viv wouldn't accidentally kick her in the face.

"Yeah," she said. "Just some stupid...fucking little panel bent up."

"Ouch."

"Yeah."

The plan was simple. Disable the landing gear, rewire the communications system to send out a distress call. If the Doctor gave the signal, reconnect the launching gear and get out before it shot off into space. Ultimately, this would result in the crew being unable to land once they'd taken off, and the distress call would guide someone to them to rescue them out of the air. The airspace around this sun was peaceful, the Doctor had explained. No wars in ages. Someone would pick them up within a month at most and take them aboard, and they wouldn't destroy anymore planets.

But all plans have their downfalls.

"Where the hell is this wiring?" TK hissed, getting thoroughly tired of being in such a cramped, hot space. "I was halfway to that Tora Nexus by now."

"It can't be too far away," she said. "It wont be too long and we'll be in the nose of the ship."

"Well...that's fancy," TK hissed, her words oozing sarcasm.

Smiling, laughing softly, Viv pulled herself up and over a corner in the shaft. "Oh looky looky I found some goodies."

"Are they up there?"

"A grate is," she said. "And I can see our goal right through that grate."

"Awesome." She pulled herself up and over the corner to find Viv picking at the screws of the grate with her fingernails. Pulling herself closer she could see the wires through the grate and over Viv's shoulder. Beside the panel of crisscrossing with a million colors of wires there was a fuse box, left slightly open to reveal the switches - color-coordinated to match the wires, so no one would get too terribly confused if something needed to fixed. Through the grate she could also see a door through which passengers could access the area without bothering with a chute. "We'll need to seal that door, somehow," she murmured.

"I think I'll leave that to you, Miss Thief," Viv said, cocking a mischievous eye toward TK with perked eyebrows.

"How far away do you think a tool room would be?"

"Not far," she said. "They'll need screw drivers and wire clippers and other things near by for working on those things. The old rich geezers would probably loose their own gold-plated asses if it was too far away."

Laughing softly, TK lifted her hands, sticking her fingertips into the grating to give it a helpful yank as the last of the screws fell away. It came off easily, but as they slid away it made a rather loud _clank_ against the bottom paneling of the cute. The two froze, their eyes widening as they looked at each other, letting a silent minute or so pass before continuing into the tiny room.

Settling herself in front of the wires and fuse box, Viv began to sort out which color went to which control for the ship. TK gently eased the door in the floor open, slipping out, her tail vanishing into the well lit hallway after her.

Pressing herself close to the bare walls, TK looked up and down the hallway, her eyes scanning for a door. There were two to her right, both colored white, and one to her left, colored pale brown. She headed for the brown one, which held no round window as the others did and was set closer to the fuse room. As she slipped into the room, her heart began to race as she heard the Doctor's voice echoing around the corner at the end of the hallway.

She had vanished into an unlit room, standing against the door for a moment to let her heart steady before lifting a hand out against the wall to her right, pawing for a light switch. About a foot from the door her fingers found a little round button. Tentatively, she pressed it, and lights flickered on over head, casting a buzzing yellow light over the small tool room. The majority of the tools were small and hanging on the wall, casting little icy shadows towards the floor.

It didn't take her eyes long to spot what she was looking for: a small welding tool for making repairs to the ship. It had gathered dust in it's time here. Apparently no one had thought that it needed to be used, but TK could firmly testify that the ship could have used a little TLC every now and again.

Snatching it up along with a little face mask, TK switched off the lights and cracked the door, listening for a moment. Her tail wasn't her likeness to the cat in her genetic code: her ears were sharp, picking up small sounds from all around, a hunter sense. Unfortunately, it came in handy more as a prey sense than a hunter sense, in her case.

The Doctor and the owners of the ship were talking in one of the rooms down the hall. The door was probably cracked a little, but if she moved now and she moved quickly they wouldn't see her.

Opening the door, letting it fall closed softly behind her, she scrambled up the little ladder built into the wall, pushing through into the room above, easing the door shut behind her. She was out of site just moments before one of the ship's owners sent Joel to investigate the little sounds in the hall.

"That was quick," Viv murmured as TK pulled the shield over her face, switching the little welding tool to on.

A little golden flame jumped from the nozzle, and as it hissed softly, she turned the knob until the flame was tiny and blue. "I'm cool like that," she murmured, her tail wavering nervously as she hoped that this wouldn't be too loud. All the welding tools that she had used on earth had been noisy. Then again, they had also been big and bulky, and the rich people had taken the best supplies when they left. Not much progress had been made after their escape from the dying planet, seeing as the people remaining were more concerned about surviving another day than making a better welding tool. "You should probably cover your eyes for a sec."

"OK." Viv paused her thinking to cover her eyes, like a monkey in one of those "hear no evil see no evil speak no evil" pictures.

Lowering the tool towards the door, TK found herself praying that this wouldn't hiss and squeal. If it did, plans would probably change drastically.

As the flame came in contact with the metal, it gave a little wheeze, but not much else.

Letting out her breath, TK relaxed, passing the flame slowly over the rim of the door. It wouldn't hold shut forever, but it would do if the ship's owners tried to come in and fix the wiring.

"Done yet?" Viv asked abruptly as TK came around to the hinges.

At the unexpected voice, TK jumped a little, the scorching flame passing over the hinges. Let out a little growl, TK turned off the tool and lifted her mask to look at the dripping hinges. Shaking it off, she gave a little shrug. It would probably just mean that anyone would below would have to do battle with the door to get it open. "Now I am."

"OK." Uncovering her eyes, Viv leaned forward, frowning at the wiring.

Setting the tool aside, TK crawled forward, looking over Viv's shoulder at the wires and fuses. "That's not good."

"Nope."

Three of the fuse labels had been worn away. A very faint imprint of letters stood on one of the labels, but there was nothing left to work with on the other ones.

"This is the communications," Viv said, pointing to the blue switch. "And this red thing is landing gear, but...One of these worn ones is connected to launch systems."

"Shit."

"Yup."

They sat for a moment, eyeing the switches.

"What does this say?" TK asked, pointing to the one with letter imprints remaining.

"I figure that says 'LT 5.' Lights in section five. Not of any use to us." Stroking her skin thoughtfully, TK frowned at the remaining two blank labels beside the yellow and green switch. "If I believed in God I would curse him right now."

"Let's at least work on the other ones," TK said. "Maybe they'll agree to go and we wont need to worry about launching systems."

"All right," Viv said slowly, turning towards the wires. "What do you want to work with?"

"Communications," TK said. "For old times." She cast dreamy eyes towards Viv. "I rewired the communication systems at the base I broke into. That's how I got out."

"Nice," Viv said with a smile and a nod. "I don't know why they wanted your head so bad. You're really cool."

"Thanks."

"No problem."

They set to their work, carefully pulling wires and resetting them, painstakingly effort going into not getting shocked and getting the wires in the right place.


	5. Chapter 6

"So. you do understand what I'm asking?" The Doctor asked, a double-check. "You have ruined the lives and homes of the people of this planet, they wish you to leave, you wont?"

Laughing, the woman with her hair like a queen, her skin thing and crinkling like tissue paper under the light in the room, she shook her head. "We will not leave this place. It has what we need, and our home planet did not."

"You do realize that you are killing this planet just as you did earth, right?" The Doctor said slowly, as if speaking to a child, frowning slightly at the tall, slender woman. "Soon it's not going to have what you or the natives need to survive."

"Then we shall just move on," she said simply with a shrug of her narrow shoulders.

Rolling her eyes, Kalimata turned them towards the door, tapping her toe irritably.

Standing by the door, Joel turned to look at her, giving a little sigh. He obviously wanted to be even less than she did.

"If I didn't know better I might think you a Sycorax,"the Doctor muttered, his frown growing deeper.

"A...what?" The woman hissed, her eyes narrowing on him.

"Sycorax," the Doctor said. "A scavenging race from the asteroid belt JX82, or the Fire Trap." Giving a little shrug, he stuffed his hands into his pockets, lifting his eyebrows as he rocked onto the balls of his feet. "They might be likened to vultures. I guess in a relative sense I'm calling you vultures, if that's easier for you to understand."

"How _dare_ you, little man!" The woman spat, lifting her little shoulders in a huffy manner, her lips pinching even tighter as she glared down at him. "We are royalty here!"

"No," the Doctor said slowly, arching his eyebrows, leaning forward slightly. "You are one of the people who just _happened_ to be lucky enough to be born with enough money to purchase your own ship and get off of earth before it died entirely and who has commandeered a planet, only to kill it as well."

"How-"

"Yeah, I know," the Doctor said, closing his eyes, lifting a hand to brush her words out of the air before they even escaped her throat. "How dare me. I will make one last plea with you." He paused, turning a quick glance at Kalimata, who waited impatiently, arms folded over her chest. "We have two others with us," he said, turning back to the woman. "They are currently rewiring your ship. If you will not leave on your own, they will destroy the wiring to your launch system and send this ship in the air without your permission, a very dangerous thing to do when the launch system wires are faulty."

"You lie," the woman hissed. "There is no one else aboard. You just want to frighten us."

"Really?" The Doctor said, nodding softly. "I don't suppose Joel here found any rats shuffling about in the hallway?" He turned to Joel, who gave a little shrug and a shake of his shaggy head. "That would be because it wasn't a rat, it was probably one of my people fetching some supplies from your tool room at the end of the hall."

The woman's eyes began to widen, until he wondered if they would pop like cherries between squeezing fingers.

"No."

"Yes," the Doctor said with a big grin.

"It's true," Kalimata said, not having said anything since entering the room. "The only reason he brought me with him is because he thought that you would be more friendly to a girl who didn't have a tail or heavily tattooed arms."

The woman's eyes flickered in a panic from Kalimata to the Doctor to the men on either side of her. "Go to the fuse room!" She screeched. "GO TO THE FUSE ROOM!"

* * *

"That is so not good," Viv muttered, crawling over to the welded door as someone beneath tried to pry it open.

"It should be secure," TK said, hurrying the last few wires into their places, turning to Viv's near finnished job and hooking two wires together, shifting the end of one wire from one circuit to another.

"It's moving," Viv said, sitting next to the door, reaching out her hands to press them on the door.

"OK," TK muttered, sitting back looking at her handiwork. "Now that fucking launch system-"

A faint shout came up the chute from outside, through the door that they had left open.

"There's the signal," TK said, reaching forward and grabbing a handful of the unidentified wires and yanking.

"GO!" Viv shouted as the door began to come loose at the destroyed hinges. "Get out! They're gonna get through!"

"Aren't you coming?" TK asked, inching towards the chute.

"I'm right behind you!" Viv yelled. "Just get out!"

TK hesitated a moment. _She broke into the TARDIS, she can get out of this_, she thought, swallowing thickly. "Good luck," she said gently before whisking away down the chute.

The destroyed, unidentified wires hung sparkling next to the fuse box, and the ship roared to life tentatively, quivering and rumbling.

Reaching down into her boot, Viv slipped out a shiv she'd snuck off a convict she was returning to prison. Holding it between the middle and ring finger of her right hand, she lifted it over her shoulder, crouching at the edge of the door as it began to shake loose.

The quick welding job cracked and splintered, the hinges shattered and the door burst up. Grabbing it with her free hand, Viv slammed it back down on the fingers of the people below before tossing it out of her way. Another hand stretched up, unmarked by the door as the other broken hands recoiled. She slammed her shiv-armed hand forward, the blade slicing right through the palm of the man attempting to climb up.

Let out a cry, the man drew back his hand, giving Viv just enough room to jump down through the door.

She landed on the ground, falling into and instinctive crouch, swinging out a foot at shin-level, taking feet out from under the bodied of several advancing people. Jumping up, she swung towards the shifting air over her shoulder, drawing the shiv across the face of one of the men with a broken hand, valiantly coming in for an attack despite his pain. Blood sprouted in a pristine line across his cheek and he jumped back as she spun, leaning back to thrust up a kick to the chest of one of the women she'd knocked down who had found her way to her feet. As the woman went down, Viv leapt over her, through the break in rising bodies, all confounded by what had just occurred.

Bolting down the hallway, she headed for the feel of fresh air as the ship lurched and shifted, lights flickering overhead and finally going out. The extra wires pulled must have linked to the lighting of the halls. She could feel that air circulation in this area had stopped, meaning those wires were directly linked to the air system in this part of the ship. Luckily, it wasn't anything too fatal.

She could hear footsteps behind her, already several paces slow. She put more and more distance between them with every second, but it was becoming hard to keep her footing as the ship shook from side to side.

Rounding the corner she saw the door, and a man blocking it, his hands on the frame as he stood looking out, his hair swirling in the wind around his face.

"Get out of my way!" She shouted, not even slowing down. But as he turned, she came to a stop. With his big brown eyes, full lips, unshaven jaw and wind-blown, dark hair, he was gorgeous. _I have to say something_, she thought, the chase falling from her mind. _But what?_ Lifting her shiv like a gun, she aimed it at him, taking a cold breath. "Malcolm Reynolds, you're under arrest!" _What?_

"I'm not Malcolm Reynolds," the man shouted over the wind. "And what the fuck is happening?"

"Oh, right," she said, hearing her pursuers finally catching up. "Jump!"

"_What?_"

"I said JUMP!" Viv screaming, raging forward, jumping, wrapping her arms around him as the brunt of her impact forced them both out the door and toppling to the ground that the ship had begun to leave behind.

* * *

The Doctor had rounded to the opened door to the chute as TK had slid out, jumping forward to slam the door shut and lock it as the ship shuddered. Grabbing TK's hand, he pulled her away as he ran after Kalimata, who had already taken off across the city square. Behind them, shoots of flame and smoke had erupted from beneath the ship, propelling it clumsily into the air. The force of the propelling explosion at their backs threw the Doctor and TK to the ground.

As he hit the cracked and dirty cement of the city square, the Doctor had spread his hands out in front of them, tearing them up on the ground. TK hit the ground without any preparation, her cheek skidding across the ground, her cat-like yowls of pain shredding the air as the ship rose slowly behind them.

It's rise was slowed mostly but it's wavering from side to side, but it did climb.

Turning over, the Doctor looked up just in time to see two figures tumbling from the door. The height at which they jumped may not have been fatal, but they would be lucky if nothing was broken. It had to have been Viv and someone she'd crashed into at the door. Only she would crash through the door at that height without stopping to glance.

They hit the ground with a dull _thud_.

Rising to his feet, the Doctor held his hands out to TK. They were shaking and bleeding from the shock of their impact on the ground, but he took her hands anyway, pulling her eyes as she bit back tears of pain and shock.

Once on her feet, TK lifted a hand to her bleeding cheek, chewing her lip.

"Are you OK?" The Doctor asked, leaning forward, lifting a tender hand to touch her injured cheek.

"I'll be fine," she growled, turning her eyes to the lumps on the ground that were the people who had jumped from the ship.

Kalimata had headed towards them, crouching beside them as Viv sat up, cradling her left wrist. "You OK?" Kalimata asked.

"I think my wrist is broken," she muttered, turning to look down at the man beside her as he rolled over, his face now dusty, contorted in pain.

He heaved a breath for which he seemed to fight, lifting a hand to his bruised and battered face. "I can...can't breathe right..."

"It's OK," Kalimata said. "You will in a moment. The wind is just knocked out of you."

"My ribs...hurt," he gasped.

"I'm sorry I had to do that," Viv said, turning onto her knees, taking one of his hands as Kalimata lifted his shirt to check his ribs. "What's your name?"

"His name is Joel," the Doctor said as he approached, his eyes still flickering back to TK, unsure of whether or not to believe her on the condition of her obviously painful face would.

"Joel?" Viv asked, turning back to look at Joel, hearing the sputtering rumble of the ship as it continued to rise through the air, all of them lit up by the glow of it's launch rockets. "That's cute."

Forcing a little grin, Joel winced as Kalimata touched his ribs.

"At least two are broken," she said, pulling his shirt back down.

"We need to get to a doctor or something," TK murmured around the pain in her face, reluctant to move her lips as the words shot pain through her nerve endings.

"What was that?" A murmur came from the edge of the city square.

Turning, the Doctor saw a young girl inching out, a few people following her as they stared up to the rocket, it's boom still thundering down over them.

The girl's skin was a pinkish color, still downy in her young age, her ears big and feathery, her eyes huge and round and darkly colored. Her two little three-fingered hands were clasped nervously before her, two small tentacles below those writhing with anxiety as she inched forward on hoofed feet. This was a young Krshorsaque without a body armor suit on. Those behind her were older, more hesitant as they came out, their skin looking more prickly than downy, their eyes cast to the sky as well.

Leaving the group behind, the Doctor darted over to them, holding his hands out to show he hand no weapons. "Hello," he said as they turned their big eyes to him. "We need some help. Some people are hurt."

"Who are you?" The young girl asked, blinking rapidly.

"I'm the Doctor," he said. "Those are my friends over there - two of them jumped from the ship and are hurt."

"What happened?" She asked.

"We sent those people away," he said. "That's all."

The girl turned to look up at her older companions, shivering slightly in the cold.

Lifting his eyes, one of the older Krshorsaque stepped forward. "There is a tavern near by. A doctor works in the attic."

"Thank you," the Doctor said. "Thank you."

* * *

"Stop," Kalimata said, watching Viv attempt to flex her injured hand.

Lifting her eyes to the bar, Viv looked at Joel, sitting stiffly with a glass of earth equivalent to whiskey in his hand.

The human female who tended the bar had given her some old, worn jeans that fit a little too loosely and hung low on her hips and a black tank top. "I don't want someone who looks _this_ much like a bounty hunter making my customers unnerved," she had said, turning a green eye on TK as she had sat down with a drink. Before wandering back stand behind the counter and tend to people's orders, she scanned TK a moment, giving her a little wink and grin.

Swallowing a big gulp of the burning alcohol in her bottle TK had looked from Viv to Kalimata. Kalimata tipped her head slightly to the side to watch the bartender as she walked away, giving a little shrug, while Viv had sighed, shaking her head softly. "She's hot."

"If only she had a penis," TK muttered, sipping her alcohol again.

Now the Doctor, TK, Viv and Kalimata sat around a round table in a dark corner of the old-western style pub with a doctor operating in the attic which, seeing as they were under ground, was actually the basement of the ruins above ground.

"That was probably the easiest thing I've done in a long time," the Doctor murmured over a glass.

"Easy, huh?" TK snipped. "Easy for you, maybe," she said, motioning to the bandage on her cheek. The disinfectant had stung the ends of her nerves like bees.

"Well, no one got taken prisoner," the Doctor said. "No one had to die, no one got tortured or maimed, we were in and out pretty quickly."

"Easy as pie," Kalimata whispered, sipping some bad wine.

Sitting with her back to the others, watching Joel as he drank. "Did you happen to find out

anything about him?" Viv asked, leaning back slightly against the table.

"Yes," the Doctor said. "We inquired him about his life, his place of origin, and his deepest ambitions. We made that priority."

TK kicked the Doctor gently under the table. "I'll take that drink from you."

"Good - it's terrible anyway," he said, screwing up his face as he shoved it towards her.

"He was basically a slave," Kalimata said. "I though I had heard his name before among a group of Jewish travelers, and I remembered them saying something about the meaning, so I asked if he was Jewish. He said he is."

"Jewish?" Viv murmured softly, tipping her head back to look at her fast friend. "What does that mean?"

Lifting an eyebrow, Kalimata just stared at Viv for a moment.

"You don't know what Jewish is?" TK asked, her brows knitting slightly as she tried to comprehend how Viv could have never heard of one of earth's old religions before.

"There is no sense of religion or spirituality on Opebocar Delta," the Doctor said softly. "No sense of spirituality. Just science." He lifted an eyebrow, tapping his fingers against the glass that TK had pushed back at him. "At least, that's how it would be if someone were to be born on Opebocar Delta. But, as I said earlier, people weren't born there. People went their. People didn't live there, they worked there."

"Sod off," Viv snarled, sitting back up, looking to Joel, her shoulders slumping slightly at the frustration of not knowing something that seemed like such simple common knowledge to her comrades and the continuing prodding of the Doctor. "What exactly are you again, Doctor?" She hissed. "And what happened to your people?" Shoving out of the chair and away from the table, she wandered off to the bar as the feeble song playing over head began to wind down.

TK turned her eyes to the Doctor as he watched Viv saunter off, leaning over the bar to ask the woman behind it a question. "What did she mean?" TK asked softly.

Giving a shrug, he pushed the cup back to TK, forcing a little grin. "I think she mistakes me," he said.

Tipping her head slightly to the side, letting her long hair fall down around her shoulders, TK gave a little sigh, picking up the glass that he had pushed to her and downing the terrible drink. "If you say so," she said. "She is, after all, just a bounty hunter."

Lowering his eyes, the Doctor turned away from TK slightly before lifting his eyes again. He looked up just in time to see Viv climb onto the bar as the music overhead grew stronger, almost overpowering in its harsh yet rolling tones. "What in the world is she doing?"

She lifted her hands into the air, stretching one out to the side as she looked down at Joel, smiling as she tipped her hips to the sides and forward slightly against the beat of the music. Joel sat below her, staring curiously up, entirely unsure of what to think.

Swinging her arms down she bent slightly at her knees, rolling her hips and her belly as she tipped back her head, her arms rising out to her side as writhing snakes. Isolating the top part of her torso, her shoulders and breasts, she popped them back and forth, chewing her lower lip as she lifted her head, letting the movement slide down to her belly and then her hips. Forcing her concentration onto each piece of her body, she moved them together, flowing and get popping according to the rhythm of the music. She closed her eyes briefly, opening them to smile down at Joel as she stepped down the bar, swaying her hips wide, keeping her ribcage virtually stone still before lifting it up and around in a tight oval, lifting her arms up like ancient Hindi gods.

Kalimata leaned to the Doctor across the table, watching Viv as she arched her back, tipping her head back, closing her eyes as she lifted her arms above her, rippling and fluid, almost boneless. "She's doing a fusion dance," she said. "It's a tribal Arabic fusion with Egyptian and gothic influences. Egyptian and Arabic are almost the same thing; the difference is the way you're carried. In Arabic you have your whole foot on the floor and the hip movement is transferred to the bending of the knee - she what she's doing there? That's more Egyptian. Look at her foot. In Egyptian you're carried on the balls of your feet and the hip movement is carried by dropping the heel to the ground...it makes for a less dramatic shimmy, like that. It's a small vibration instead of a full swing. You see the full swing in Arabic - she's going into Arabic now - watch the way she keeps her foot flat on the ground, letting the knee bend and her hip drops. Also, Egyptian is a bit more...mobile...lots of walking all over the stage, which is what she's doing. She needing to improvise a little because the 'stage' in this case is actually a bar. The gothic influences, you'll see, are when she is very pop-and-lock with her joints, very robotic."

Frowning, the Doctor shook his head. "OK, but _what_ is she doing?"

Leaning close to the Doctor, TK lifted a hand to Joel as Viv swung around, her arms rippling through the air before she came to a halt, swaying her hips quickly up and down. "I think that she's dancing for the boy."

"You humans and your strange mating rituals," the Doctor said, shaking his head.

"I didn't teach her that," Kalimata said, lifting a finger to point at Viv as she dropped to the counter in an almost perfect leg-split, her knees bent back as she popped her torso up, lifting one hand to push her bangs back from her eyes as she fell back on the other, popping her hips up. She jumped her feet up, letting a roll flow up from her hips to her breasts before finding her way to her feet, giving a quick spin and stretching her arms out, returning to the rippling belly dance. "That was more like pole dancing...without a pole."

"Where did she learn _that_, do you suppose?" TK said, comically arched eyebrows. "Certaintly not in the labs on Opebocar Delta."


	6. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

"OK, steady now," the Doctor said, TK's arm flung over his shoulder as he guided her carefully back to the TARDIS. She was more drunkenly dragging her feet than trying to lift them and step forward.

"Yuh know the only thing...that we found still grew very...very good, was marijuana." She paused, thinking back on the people growing marijuana where they could no longer grow corn. Then she burst into laughter. "POT! We couldn't barely grow wheat or even fucking popotatoes...haha...potatoes...but, by God, we could grow pot!" Throwing her head back, TK laughed drunkenly as the Doctor fumbled with the key of the TARDIS, finally getting the door open and dragging her inside.

Kalimata had stayed behind at the bar to talk to the bartender, and he wasn't really sure where Viv had gone. He'd at least managed to keep track of TK, who was now severely drunk and couldn't find her own nose let alone her way back to the TARDIS. So, tired of staying the smoky pub himself, the Doctor had helped her back, half-carrying half-dragging her as she reminisced about days back on earth and continually insisted that she could walk just fine.

Guiding her onto the TARDIS and to her bunk, he flopped her down onto her bed as carefully as he could. Laughing, she dragged him down with her.

Sitting up beside her, the Doctor laughed at her, shaking his head. "How's your cheek?"

"I can't even...barely feel it," she said, her eyes closed, lolling her head softly from side to side.

"You'll feel it all very well in the morning," he said, standing.

Opening her eyes, TK reached forward, grabbing his hand and pulling him back down. "Doctor!"

"What? What?" The Doctor asked, letting himself be pulled back down, looking at her, half expecting her bandage to have pulled free and her cheek to have started badly bleeding. But she was just sitting there, looking up at him, her strange, beautifully colored eyes wide. "What?" He asked against when she hadn't said anything.

"Oh," she murmured. "Sorry 'bout that."

"You should sleep."

"But wait-"

"What?"

Lifting a hand, she encircled the back of his neck with her soft fingers, pulling him down, pressing her lips to his.

Startled, the Doctor put his hand son either side of her, moving to pull back. He hesitated, though, for just a moment letting himself kiss her back, before finally pulling away. "Uh...you...You should probably just get some sleep."

Laughing, closing her eyes, TK curled her legs up onto her bunk, nodding. "I am very sleepy..."

"OK..." He said, nodding, looking away as he stood, moving towards the door, stepping back and turning to pull a blanket over her before vanishing to his own room, shaken, visions of Rose dancing in his head.

* * *

"There is something seriously wrong with you," Joel said with a wincing smile as he broke from Viv's kiss.

With a sympathy wince, almost as though it was her ribs that had hurt her, Viv lowered a hand from his shoulder, gingerly touching his ribcage. "Yeah, there is," she said with a little half-smile as she looked up at him. "Sorry about your ribs."

"Don't apologize," he said, tipping his lips to press them to hers. "I'm finally away from those fucking ass holes. I don't care that my ribs are broken - they'll heal."

"Well, then," Viv murmured, lifting her eyebrows. "You certainly seem to have changed since falling from the spaceship."

"It finally dawned on my that I don't have to take orders anymore," he said with a perfect smile. "I don't _have _to watch my mouth. I only have to watch my mouth if I _want_ to watch my mouth."

Laughing as he leaned forward, he bowed his lips to her neck as she laughed. "What will you do now?" She asked. "Now that you are a free man, I mean."

"I dunno," he murmured, leaning back again, gazing up at the sky that he almost expected to have stars again, now that the occupying humans had been cast out.

"You could come with us," Viv offered up quickly, lifting a hand to his chin, drawing his attention back down as she gave him a big smile.

"And were do you go?" He asked skeptically, on eyebrow slightly raised above his dark eyes, made almost black in the night time of the ruins above the pub.

Smiling, Viv gave a tiny shrug. "I don't know. I haven't been part of the troop for very long."

"Can you go to the stars?" He asked softly, looking back up at the wide, ashen sky.

"I think so," she said, lifting a hand once again, this time to just cup his heavily stubble-lined cheek as he looked into what he imagined was a vast expanse of existence, open for exploration. He imagined that it was just as the skies on earth had been at night - pin-pricked with too many diamonds to fathom.

Lowering his eyes back to hers, he sighed softly, shaking his head. "What will happen to this planet?" He asked softly. "The skies are thick with smoke. It's toxic."

Pursing her lips, Viv bowed her eyes towards the earth. "I don't know." A smile jumped to her lips as her eyes returned to his. "But I bet the Doctor would." Taking his hand, she pulled him away from the rubble and down the street. "Come on! Let's ask him!"

* * *

The Doctor was sitting against the bottom of the control board, rubbing his eyes. They felt more tired than usual.

When a loud _thump thump_ came to the door of the TARDIS, he startled, knocking his head back against the control board base.

Rubbing his head, he got to his feet with a frown, and stalked to the door. Pulling it open, he was greeted by Viv's smiling face and her new found companion. "You're back," he said, relaxing, stepping back to let them in. He wasn't in the mood to fight another tag-a-long.

"We were wondering," she asked as she stepped inside. "Is there anything we can do about the smoke in the skies?"

Shaking his head, The Doctor lifted his hands, running his fingers through his hair. "It'll only clear up with time."

"Are you sure?" Joel asked, stepping forward slightly.

"Yeah," the Doctor said, looking up at Joel. "I mean - there are future technologies from other planets, but...I can't very well give it to them. They're not supposed to have it yet."

"This wasn't supposed to happen either, though," Joel said, motioning to the door in indication of the destruction outside.

Lifting a hand to circle around the back of his neck, the Doctor looked down the line of Joel's arm towards the door. "I'm sorry, Joel-"

"Can't you go back and prevent them coming at all?" Viv asked, frowning slightly up at the Doctor.

His eyes turned towards hers, waiting for an answer. "We're nearing a slippery slope," he said softly. Turning his eyes back to Joel, he straightened his gradually slumping back, offering a rather forced little smile. "I think it'd be better to show you 'round the TARDIS."

"I'll do that," Viv growled, taking Joel's hand and she looked up at him. "Would you rather see where to get food or where to sleep first?"

The Doctor watched them stalk off together, and felt his hearts burning against his ribs. No one was around, so he let the burn show on his face. His brows drawn together, his big eyes narrowed, his brow creased. Once again he was wanting to take her and dump her at the door of Torchwood.

"In any case," he muttered to himself, spinning towards the controls of the TARDIS. "The tests say the smoke isn't as toxic as I would have thought. Different fuels here, I suppose-"

Another knock at the door and another start. He moved to open it irritably, half expecting Kalimata to have dragged the girl from the bar back with her.

"You waited," Kalimata said, offering up a pleasant smile.

"More like I waited for..." He jerked his head back towards the bunk area. "Vivian."

"Ah..." Kaliamat said with a slow nod and a smile. "It's OK, I understand. I said I wanted to be dropped here, but...well..."

"Not what you were expecting?"

"Exactly."

Nodding softly, he stepped aside, holding out his arm to silently invite her in.

Maybe it wouldn't be so bad...have a group, however odd and dysfunction it would surely be. At least one of them should last past year - or, at least, he would hope. As he closed the doors behind Kalimata and returned to the controls, hearing her wander back to the bunks, he found himself hoping that it would be TK to stay.


	7. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

Throwing open the door, the Doctor scrunched up his nose as he squinted out at the planet before him. "Gliese 581 O?" He asked no in particular, frowning out at the dry, barren earth standing below a greenish sun. He could see the two moons settling below the empty horizon, one bluish-purple and riddled with gray pockmarks, the other an almost fluorescent yellow.

"Gliese 581 O?" TK asked, shoving her head under the Doctor's arm to peek out, her eyes traveling over the empty landscape. Making a face, she pulled back, wandering back over to the controls. "I think we should go to a planet that is actually _alive_," she said, looking up at the flickering blue column.

"I wanted to go to New New Earth," the Doctor said, turning to frown up at the column. "Really? _Really?_"

"TARDIS still having problems?" Kalimata asked, slipping past the TARDIS to step onto the dry, crackling earth. She paused, looking this way and that as a faint, dry breath of wind whipped her skirts around. "Um...is there supposed to be life, or...?"

"It's always been a dry planet," the Doctor murmured, watching TK as she examined the blue column, as though willing it to take them to New New Earth. She hadn't seemed to remember much from that night of drinking. She certainty didn't seem to remember the drunken kiss. "Though...it does seem a little drier," he said, yanking his eyes from her and stepping out into the dry, hot morning. "Hotter, too."

Viv hopped out of the TARDIS, turning her eyes towards the sky. She hadn't been in much of a talking mood after the Doctor warded her off of his slippery slope. She asked him curtly: "What is this place, again?"

"Gliese 581 O," he said, "Home of the gorphins." He gave a little smile to the sky. "A pleasant, peaceful race." Frowning, he turned his eyes back to the landscape. "Speaking of...where are all the buildings?"

"Is that a building?" Kalimata asked, standing to the side of the TARDIS, pointing in the direction opposite that of which the buildings faced. "Or...is that a giant termite mound or something?"

Rounding the TARDIS, the Doctor squinted out at the strange structure in the distance. "Looks like a building. Bit crumbly, but a building all the same."

"Doctor..." Came TK's voice from the door of the TARDIS. Her footfalls came shortly, and soon she was standing beside him, looking out at the crumbling building in the distance. "What is that?"

"A building," he muttered. "Any one else want to go check it out?"

"Me," Viv said, raising her hand like a child in class.

Turning his eyes to her, he asked: "Where's Joel?"

"Resting," she said as she started out towards the building in the distance. "He's found himself rather sore, what with those broken ribs and whatnot."

"That would make sense," Kalimata said, reaching up to tap the Doctor's temple once before heading off after her friend.

Turning to TK, the Doctor offered up a smile, holding out his hand to her. "I assume you're up for it?"

"Psh!" TK snorted with a smile and a roll of her eyes, seizing his hand firmly. "Up for it? When am I not?"

* * *

The dryness of the earth beneath the Doctor's feet unnerved him. He did not remember the earth here to be so dry that it had hardened as stone. Cracks shattered out from every point on the surface, leaving it all looking deathly, abandoned, burnt.

As they neared the crumbling building, the Doctor's eyes narrowed on the wisps of smoke winding up from their burnt spires. Near the building, they could see now, was a tree: jagged in death. There was no water here, it seemed.

"Is that a factory?" TK asked, hop-skipping several paces out in front of the group, squinting up at the building. "It reminds me of the old factory's on earth - none of them were working of course, but smoke still came out of some of them. I don't know why."

"It looks rather like a factory, now, doesn't it?" The Doctor murmured, shoving his hands in his pockets as he paused, looking up at the towers. As he examined them, he realized that they were billowing - just a very small portion of the emissions were visible. The majority of them only rippled in the sunlight like a disturbance in space and time, but that didn't make them any less deadly. Tipping his head back, he closed his eyes and sniffed the air. "Elanian carbonmust," he said, opening his eyes, frowning up at the building.

"What's that?" Kalimata asked, turning her eyes back to the Doctor.

"Kinda like oil," he murmured, walking forward slowly, his brain turning quickly. "Low melting point, slightly higher burning point. When harvested it comes in rock hard, black sheets - put it in a boiler and crank up the heat you get a fully functional fossil fuel. When you're near it, it smells something like...like..." He lifted a hand from his pocket, bowing his head as he snapped his fingers. "...What you humans call...oh! Acorns!" He said, lifting his eyes, pointing at TK as she tilted her head, giving him a mildly confused grin. "It smells like acorns, but oh..." He shook his head, spinning on his heel to look back up at the building, clucking his tongue against the roof of his mouth. "It's not quite so friendly as your average acorn."

"Are you saying that they're doing to this planet what was done to Earth?" TK asked with a frown as she approached the Doctor, motioning back towards the TARDIS.

"Something like that," he said, eyebrows arched as he continued to think. "Something like that. Elanian carbonmust does to the atmosphere here was burning oil did to Earth's atmosphere, but it works in a different way - you see, the atmosphere here is made up of slightly different chemical fusion and balances - the only reason you're not all coughing up your left lung is because the TARDIS is protecting you in a way. So this stuff doesn't burn like oil - it really isn't oil in any rational sense, but it's used for the same purposes and does the same thing-"

"Yes, covered," Kalimata said.

"Is that why everything is so dead?" Viv asked, crossing her arms with a frown.

"That is _exactly_ why everything is so dead," the Doctor said, continuing towards the building. "Almost."

"Almost?" TK asked. "What else is there?"

"I dunno, but there has to be something," the Doctor said, glancing at her over his shoulder. "Elanian doesn't destroy so quickly-" He paused, frowning down towards the crackling earth. "Unless it really has been that long since I've been here." Lifting his eyes, he glanced around. "Come to think of it...there's only the one tree."

"They cut down all the trees," TK murmured. "What about bushes and grass?" She asked, glancing around. "I haven't seen any of those either - so, there's nothing absorbing carbon dioxide? Nothing filtering it into something breathable?"

"Essentially," the Doctor said with a frown. "Must've burned those all, as well."

"But why?" Viv asked. "Why so blatantly destroy the planet?"

"Someone doesn't care," he said, titling his head to the side as he marched forward.

"But once the planet is gone-" TK started.

"They move on," the Doctor finished.

"Do you know what _they_ are?" Kalimata asked.

"Not another group of lost earthlings?" Viv asked.

"No," the Doctor said, shaking his head. "Those ships wouldn't make it all the way out here. They aren't built to resist this star's flares, either. Caught up in one they would burn to a crisp."

"So, what then?" TK asked.

"I'm not sure," he said. "Not gorphins. They're simple creatures-" He turned towards the group, walking along backwards with his hands in his pockets. "Not in a bad way - simple creatures are good. They're peaceful, they don't care for war. They also don't care to burn fossil fuels and chop down trees and bushes and harvest ever bit of grass for fuel. They're entirely content to live in burrows and harvest."

"What are they eating, if there's nothing left?" Viv asked.

"They're probably getting food from there," TK muttered, nodding with disgust towards the building before them.

"Good," the Doctor said with an approving smile. "They probably are." Turning to face forward again, he heaved a heavy sigh. "Which brings us right back to the question of who we're dealing with."

"Dealing with?" Kalimata asked. "As in, we're saving the day again?"

"Come on," the Doctor hissed. "That last one was way too easy."

"I'm not opposing it," Kalimata said. "I just want to be sure of what I heard."

"Well, in that case, yeah," the Doctor said with a curt nod. "Anyway - the gorphins _must_ be getting food from whoever is in this building-"

"Essentially they're being exploited?" TK asked.

"I don't doubt it in the least," the Doctor said, giving the wavering emissions from the stacks another disgusted glance. "I'm going to guess that they're using the food supply to keep the gorphins under control (not that it would be a big feat or anything) and maybe even to keep them working manufacturing something. Anyone who needs _that_ much energy is manufacturing either a lot of something or a very large something. Any guesses?" He asked, spinning on his heel briefly to look at TK.

She gave a little shrug. "I've got nothing."

"I'd say weapons or machinery, like a ship or something," Viv murmured. "I doubt that their main production efforts are geared towards food and supplies, unless it's to be traveling a long distance with a large group."

"Well," the Doctor said, picking up speed. "I suppose we'll just have to see!"

* * *

"How do we get in?" Kalimata asked as they rounded the building, which they discovered was much smaller than expected once they were standing at the base of it.

Made up of mostly thin smoke stacks, the building towered but was small in circumference, and every one of the stacks showed considerable wear. It appeared to be made of mostly mud bricks, which would explain away the wear despite the buildings absence in the Doctor's memory. He continued to swear up and down that he had last been to this planet about ten years ago on the planet's time line - probably fifty or sixty years in his time line.

"Front door," the Doctor said, motioning as they came across the door, huge and metallic, the only part of it that looked like it might still be around in twenty years.

"We're walking in through the front door?" Viv asked with a scrunched nose to express her disgust.

"Unlike you," he said, turning his eyes to Viv, "I am not a bounty hunter and I've never been entirely fond of creeping around in ventilation systems."

"I vote against the ventilation systems, too," TK murmured.

"Besides," the Doctor said, looking up at the building. "It doesn't look like there's any other way in or out except those windows. How high up would say those are?"

"At least five stories," Kalimata said, looking up at the thin windows. Even if they were to climb to them, there was no guarantee that any of them would fit through one.

"OK," he said, rolling his shoulders as though in preparation. "Let's go."

Whatever it was that had built this building was tall. Though the door knob was a little lower than an average door knob on a human door, there was another one higher up and the door was very tall. The two knows were obviously built in to accommodate two very different races, and this fact made it easier for the group to get in.

"The low knob is for the gorphins," the Doctor said quietly as they walked in through the massive door. "The high one must be for the architects-"

"Holy shit," Viv coughed, waving a hand before her face as the stagnant, poison-smelling air crashed against them like a wall.

The Doctor joined in the coughing a well, lifting a hand over his nose and mouth as he squinted around the circular room through the smoky air. By the looks of it there wasn't even a ventilation system through which they might have crawled - just the smoke stacks and slit-windows.

They were standing on something of a wooden catwalk looking down on a room that was wide and gaping below the surface. Machines thrummed and ticked away, gears grinding and filling the air with the screech of metal-on-metal and the _thud_ of products dropping on the squeaky conveyor belts. Smoke billowed up from around the machines, gathering the stink of ill and flaking skin, burning hair and sweat as it rose towards a single circular opening in the ceiling.

"This is terrible," TK choked, pulling up her shirt around her nose as she moved towards the railing to stand beside the Doctor and look down into the production arena.

"Well," the Doctor coughed, peering down through the wasted air to the workers around the machines. "I was right about the gorphins being used for work."

"Those are gorphins?" Viv asked from behind her hand as she leaned over the railing, trying to see the creatures moving below better.

"Yes," the Doctor said. "Those are gorphins."

They were the size of a massive dog - perhaps a Saint Bernard, maybe a bit bigger. They must have stood to the Doctor's hips if not slightly higher. They moved slowly around on three fairly undeveloped-looking feet: they vaguely resembled the body of a slug on the bottom of their stout legs. They walked with their back to the ground and their belly up, their round heads looking out over a thick tail which curled up over their exposed belly like a chameleon's. The tail sprouted over the third leg, and was prehensile: they carried equipment about with their tail, as their three feet were occupied with walking. They have big, almond-shaped eyes and a nose resembling that of a ghost bat, looking something like a small satellite. They had two pairs of big ears: the front-most ears were big and droopy while the ones perched high on the skull and further back were big and bat-like. They were colored dully, and the girls couldn't tell if they were covered with fine fur or bare skin.

"How odd," Kalimata, who had been trying to save her breath, murmured behind her hand.

"They're adorable," Viv squeaked, giving a huge smile.

Upon Viv's little squeak, several of the gorphin's wobbled their ears about, and a moment later were gazing up at them. Their small mouths bore little frowns, their eyes drooped. They didn't look well-fed.

The Doctor's eyes traveled to the walls. He noted the piping and wiring flowing down them from the floor above, bending at the base of the wall to continue towards the walls of the production arena. The Elanian was being processed above. Some of it was being poured down the pipes directly into some machines, while some of the energy of the burned fuel was being sent down through wires to other machines.

"We need to go up before we can do anything down here," he said softly, turning his eyes around, seeking the stairs or ladder up.

"There," TK said, pointing across the circular room.

The cat-walk continued along the wall to the other side. They followed it to the ladder and, one by one, with the Doctor leading the way, they climbed up towards the second level.

The second level was where the five-story high windows started. This room seemed much cleaner - the air was easy to see through, at least, and the smell wasn't as rancid. In the middle of the room the pipe carrying the smoke up rose, acting a barrier to block the view of the opposite side of the room. They could hear it, though, and feel it too. Heat boiled around towards them, fires roared. Whatever they were holding the Elanian in kept the majority of the smell at bay, but the faint smell of acorns laced the air.

Looking up, the Doctor saw that the ladder did not continue here. It must have been on the other side of the room, forcing anyone trying to make their way up to show their faces to the workers here if the workers below hadn't already seen them.

"Clever enough," the Doctor murmured, starting around to the other side of the room.

The instant they came into view of the massive black boilers, the gorphins all turned their heads towards the intruders. Their big eyes looked confused, a couple of them blinked, dumbfounded, and all bat-like ears in the room swiveled at a mad pace.

"Who are you?" The nearest gorphin asked, turning and moving slowly towards them. They were not speedy creatures.

"I am the Doctor," he said, stepping forward. "These are some of my companions," he said, motioning to the others. "What has happened here?"

The gorphin's eyes flickered from the Doctor to the girls and back again. "The Doctor?"

"Yes," he said softly. "I need to know what has happened here, who's done this."

"They never said what they were called," the gorphin said after a moment, apparently deciding that the Doctor and the girls were trustworthy. Letting out a sigh, he closed his eyes, bowed his head. "They came in, built this..."

"We saw the trees are gone," the Doctor said gently.

"Yes...the trees, the brush - everything. Just a few dead reminders remain."

"Do you know why?"

"Just that they wanted workers, and taking away every chance for us to make our own livelihoods was the best way to get us all working." Lifting his eyes again, he continued: "And many of us disappear. If we question we are made to work harder, longer, for less food. So no one asks, anymore. All of those who wouldn't stop asking have disappeared themselves."

Frowning softly, the Doctor kneeled down to eye-level with the gorphin. "What is your name?"

"Anfelah," he said.

"Anfelah," the Doctor murmured softly. "What do they look like?"

Sighing, his lower lip pouting slightly, Anfelah looked down, his bat-ears swiveling, listening for them. "They are tall...very, very thin. Their limbs are so long, almost like strings...they have many joints, so that when they move they look almost as though they don't even have bones. When they first came they studied us - interviewed, asked questions, ran tests. I hear they have massive collections of data on our race in the upper level, all of their research. Then they did this..."

The Doctor's features had slackened slightly, his brown relaxing as his lips parted and his eyes widened ever so slightly.

"Do you know what they are, Doctor?" TK asked.

"Koronkights," he murmured. "They're migrating."


	8. Chapter 9

Chapter 9

"OK, I'll ask," TK ventured when no one else spoke as the Doctor paced back and forth before the frightened gorphin. "What exactly are Koronkights?"

"They're - they're these parasitic beings, but they're not quite parasites -" His thoughts were moving too fast for his mind. Pressing his fingers through his hair, eyes clamped shut, he tried to keep up with whirring mind. "The last I heard of them they were still following the guidelines set down by a collective, Honourable Coalition," he said quickly. "The Coalition was a group of leaders - there was a Time Lord leader among them - koronkights had threatened the Time Lords so there was a representative of Gallifrey. Together, the Coalition set down a collective agreement reached by the races. It was an agreement to help the races keep out of each other's way - last I knew the koronkights were still following it's rules!"

"What were the rules?" Kalimata asked, having sat down against the massive pipe in the center of the room.

"There were thousands of rules," the Doctor said, the words slipping from his mouth, nearly out of control. "There were thousands, but basically - the rules barred the Koronkights from invading the planets of the races in the coalition and kept them restricted to the fringe planets around their sun, the ones that didn't want to be in the coalition, the war-like planets."

"And what did they do to those planets that had endangered the Time Lords?" TK asked carefully.

"Koronkights don't reproduce," the Doctor said, his words moving at a faster and faster pace. "They are incapable of reproducing sexually or asexually -"

"So, they don't reproduce as humans do," Kalimata interrupted, "or as bacteria, protists - whatever, do?"

"Right," the Doctor said hurriedly. "They - oh...they _infect_!" He hissed, knotting his hands before him as his pace grew quicker and quicker. "They infect other beings, very gradually taking over their bodies, rewriting the biology of the creature, _reforming_ them into a new member of the species! _That's_ what they're doing here!" He punched the air, jumping and spinning to face TK. "They're here to spread! They're using the gorphins to spread _and_ to refine the Elanian to power machines to create the parts for their ships which the gorphins are manually putting together, ships which will _also_ be powered by refined Elanian! That's what they're doing! Before the coalition stepped in, their species was a threat to their galaxy, to the _universe_, but the coalition was able to put a stop to that. The coalition - well...the coalition is no longer functioning, and they've finally realized that there is no one to reinforce the laws." He turned, snapping his fingers as the gears in his mind continued to tick. He turned his attention back to Anfelah. "They ran tests and did surveys because their very nature of taking over the biology of other species means that it is necessary for them to learn how best to do so, how best to turn the species into servants - how best to use the species own culture against them. They are _anthropologists_ because they _need_ to know everything they can about the species they are going to destroy before they are able to destroy them."

"They sound like a nasty case of the flu," Viv muttered.

"They are," the Doctor bit out, turning his eyes upward. "And they're all right up there..."

"Are we going to wipe them out?" TK prodded.

"No," the Doctor said, crunching up his nose with distaste at the idea. "We're going to make them leave, is all."

"You realize that may mean wiping them out," Kalimata said.

"Let's leave genocide as a last resource," the Doctor bit out, moving back towards the stairs. "Thank you for all your help, Anfelah!" He said over his shoulder to the gorphin. "I promise - we'll sort this thing out!"

* * *

As they climbed the stairs, the Doctor's voice dropped to a whisper. "They've been taking gorphins and using them to reproduce," the Doctor said quietly as they crept up the stairs. "But there still can't be many here. If they've broken the laws, it must have been because their numbers were dwindling. They always were something of a cowardly race...they never wanted to break the laws for fear of extinction. That's what drives them. Fear of extinction."

"Isn't that what drives most species?" Kalimata asked softly.

"Fear of extinction isn't a conscious fear," the Doctor said. "It's buried away in instinct. Most evolved species have bread out the majority of those instincts, which threaten to lead them backwards as far as evolution goes - that's a different thing, entirely, though. For koronkights, fear of extinction isn't subconscious. It is conscious."

Giving a little shrug in the dark, Kalimata, TK, and Viv continued up the stairs. When they reached the top, the Doctor gently pushed open the door, peering in.

A glow settled over the room, eerie and slightly pulsing.

Stepping into the pale blue-green pulse of the glow, the Doctor frowned around the room. The glow was flowing from massive beakers, filled with florescent liquid and mutating bodies. Most of the bodies were halfway between gorphin and koronkight. Some were further along, others had barely begun to change.

"Well, this is different," the Doctor murmured as he strode carefully down the line of beakers. They towered over him, were so thick none of the humanoids could wrap their arms around them. Tubes were crammed down the throats and noses of each body floating in the thick, glowing liquid, wires stuck in everywhere.

Staring up at the beakers with wide eyes, Viv held towards the back of the group, her body tense, her hands poised and ready.

The Doctor glanced over his shoulder at Viv as the others passed him in their curiosity. He gave her a little squint of a curious frown as he watched her eyes reflect the glow of the beakers, her feet move slowly over the ground, not picking up enough to make the sound of footfalls.

"Reminded of something?" He asked softly, abruptly after a moment.

The sound of his voice startled her. She jumped, shaking her head, flexing her hands as she opened her eyes, shooting him a burning glare. "Are you?"

His eyes flickered towards a nearby mutating body. It looking like nothing that should live: the thick skin and thin, soft fur of the gorphin body wrinkling, peeling and flaking away. The big bat ears were disintegrating in the liquid, leaving only bits of cartilage left, which would soon, too, fall away. The slug-shaped paws were curling in on themselves, looking disease-ridden, riddled with grotesque, wart-like lumps. The tail had curled against the belly and seemed to be rotting into the flesh, melding.

Swallowing, closing his eyes and shaking his head, he shook away the grim thought of grotesque biological tests performed by Daleks.

Turning his back on Viv, he continued to catch up with the others, leaving her to follow at her own stop-motion pace.

"So where are these things?" TK asked as he approached.

"Close by," he murmured softly as he bypassed them, moving towards the faint door at the end of the long hall.


	9. Chapter 10

Chapter 10

The Doctor opened the door and stepped in. That was it - no grand plan or grand entry. He seemed rather fond of simply walking through the front door.

The girls were startled when they saw the koronkights. After seeing the things in the beakers outside, they certainly weren't expecting these.

The koronkights stood tall and regal, their pale, blue-tinged skin giving them and aerial, almost gaseous look as they turned to look at the intruders with their huge, oval eyes donning irises ranging from silver to green and large, reflective pupils. Their long arms did indeed look boneless as they held their hands out: their palms were long and thin and donned many, many long, thin fingers. They were slender and seemed to hover over the floor. The reality was that their stood on top of toes curled under their feet, many, many toes which were nearly identical to their nearly transparent fingers.

They were beautiful and seemed to glow. They didn't look like a bad case of the flu at all.

"Knock knock," the Doctor chirped as he shoved his hands into his pockets, waltzing forward that characteristic sway in his step. "Doctor's in."

"Doctor?" Hissed the nearest koronkight. Her voice was soft and lilting. It reminded the girls of a breath of wind. "The Doctor?"

Another closed its eyes, taking in a deep breath. "_Time Lord_..."

Waving her ribbon-fingers in disbelief, the female closed her eyes as the Doctor approached. "Nonsense. The Times Lords are extinct."

TK exchanged glances with Kalimata and Viv as they followed the Doctor's lead, marching forward with puffed out chests.

"I'm the last," the Doctor said softly as he came to halt near the female, tipping his head back to look up at her. "And I seem to have stumbled upon a quite illegal operation."

"It is no longer illegal, _impostor_," she spat, refusing to believe in what the Doctor was. "There is no one remaining to enforce the laws, voiding them."

"I'm here," the Doctor stated, rocking up on the balls of his feet. "As long as I am here there is someone to enforce the laws."

"Be gone with you!" The koronkight hissed, waving her hand to him. "Be gone! There are no more Time Lords! They have vanished into the realm of tales and legend!"

The Doctor gave a bright grin. "In that case, you stand in the presence of a legend."

"_Gone_!"

"I know you know what I am," the Doctor said, letting out a low breath. "You know that I am a Time Lord. You know how powerful I am. You know I have the power to erase you from time and space if need be, so don't make this hard." He paused, lowering his voice. "I've seen enough genocide's to fill a thousand lifetimes."

"Genocide," one of the koronkights droned, with a roll of his eyes. "Time Lords and their sentiments."

"There are many of us," the female hissed, eyes narrowing. "Only one of you."

"And my friends," the Doctor said, lifting an eyebrow as he motioned back towards the others. "Never underestimate. I once had a companion absorb the time vortex." He flashed a cocky smile. "Now I've got three with me."

The female's eyes ticked towards the girls before she shook her head. "You are not worth my time." She turned her back on the Doctor, motioning to a couple of koronkights in the back of the room. They were carrying a bundle wrapped in what looked like the silk of a spider. It writhed in their arms as they split it open and dumped it into a small bowl of jelly similar to the liquid in the beakers outside.

"Bad idea," Viv hissed.

The Doctor heard the unmistakable click of a gun. Before he could turn, the sound of chambers emptying filled the room.

_Not the plan, not the plan!_ He hit the floor, closing his eyes and gritting his teeth as screeches of pain reverberated through the air.

"What the fuck did you just do?" TK's voice rang through the air.

Lifting himself from the floor, the Doctor did a double take. Three of the koronkights had been struck dead and one had fallen against the still living, badly injured. Viv had leapt over one of the dead bodies, dunking her arms into the jelly and yanking out the form that had been dropped in. It appeared to be a young gorphin, no more than a year old, and sat like an oversized puppy in Viv's now drenched arms as she spun back towards the Doctor.

"You better be planning on running!" The Doctor yelled, feeling his face flush as he turned back towards the uninjured koronkight. They seemed shocked, their eyes following Viv as she darted for the door.

"I don't know that there was ever any other plan," Kalimata bit out as she ran after Viv.

"I guess we go, too?" TK called as she followed, the Doctor on her heels.

Getting down wasn't so easy as getting up. Guards had abruptly flooded the room of glowing beakers, and as the group ran from the office at the end of the room, the air filled with curses.

The Doctor grabbed TK's hand and yanked her one way while Viv took her rescued gorphin baby and went another. Kalimata darted in a different direction entirely, leaving the group shattered into three pieces, hiding amidst the shadow and glow of the beakers.

"Stay close," the Doctor hissed, pulling TK against him as he peered around one of the beakers.

These were new koronkights. They, too, seemed shocked by the gunshots that had erupted in the office and the sudden burst of intruders running into the beaker room. They stood for a moment, blinking, before fanning out through the room.

Cursing, TK pressed her body against the beaker, looking up at the form of the hardly changed gorphin that was hiding them from view. "What do we do now?"

"Think think think think," the Doctor hissed to himself, closing his eyes. He felt a brief moment of terror, something that simply should have stayed at bay. The sensation of being trapped clapped its clammy hands over his ears, threatening to collapse his skull. He almost felt hot fingers between his shoulder blades, if only for just a moment, before he shook his head, opening his eyes.

"We need to get into the office again," he said, turning his eyes towards the office door. They were close to it. They might be able to make a break for it and close the doors behind them before the koronkights could catch up to them. Unfortunately, that was a big maybe.

"Where are the others?" TK whispered.

The Doctor opened his mouth to reply, but shut it again as one of the koronkights passed close by. He could feel TK's body stiffen against his, her tail twining anxiously around his calf and squeezing.

Turning his eyes about, the Doctor caught a glimpse of Kalimata through the beakers. She had seen him as well, as after she vanished for a moment, she reappeared, motioning towards him. Frowning, he turned his eyes in the direction she was waving, and saw Viv.

The little gorphin was shivering against her shoulder, holding onto her neck with his sluggish paws. She was lifting her gun, carefully taking aim, and he couldn't help but wonder _Where did she keep that bloody gun?_

He could see her finger tighten on the gun. He couldn't have there be any more killing today.

Releasing his grip on TK, he stepped forward, feeling her tail snake free of his leg as he did so. "PUT DOWN THE BLASTED GUN!" He shouted, lifting his hands into the air as he ran out into the open.

TK bit her tongue, squeezing her hands tightly to resist the urge to follow him. He turned and gave her a tiny motion with his hand, waving her back further amid the shadows. Swallowing, she nodded, stepping back slightly.

"What the fuck?" Viv mouthed at him as he stretched his hands towards the ceiling, turning about and looking at the koronkights surrounding him.

"I am unarmed!" He said. "One of my _companions_-" he spat the word "-fired without any permission of mine! I didn't know she had a weapon!"

"What are you?" One of the koronkights asked. They didn't move forward anymore as their eyes flickered over the Doctor's shoulder, and he knew that the female leader was striding out. She had, apparently, been one of the uninjured.

"Time Lord," he said quickly, turning to look at the female as she broke through the circle, her eyes narrowing on him. "I'm The Doctor."

For a long moment the female didn't speak. "I suppose you are as you say," she said quietly after a moment. "But the fact remains: you are no match for our growing army."

"Army for what?" The Doctor asked tentatively. He wasn't sure that he wanted to hear the answer.

The female let out a loud, breathy laugh. "For what do you think?" He asked, shaking her head. "Shall I take you, Time Lord? Use your body to create my offspring?"

"Bad idea," he bit out, his eyes meeting hers evenly. "I just learned today what a temper Viv has. I also have no doubt that she'll get out of here and burn this place to the ground after seeing these beakers. Call is _post traumatic stress_."

"What is this creature of yours, this..._Viv_?" The female asked.

"She's no creature of mine," he said. "And after this, no companion of mine."

"But what is she?" The female pressed.

"Ask her," he said, "because I don't know. Whatever it is, it's unnatural."

"And your other one?" The female asked. "There is a human among your girls. The other one who isn't quite human. What is she?"

"Mostly human," he said. "Bit of cat, and an assortment of other things we're not quite sure of." He shook his head. "You can't use them."

She laughed again. "And why not?"

"You can't use Viv for the very simple reason of bad chemical reactions," he said, as though it all made sense and was very obvious. "And you can't use TK because I'm not letting her go so easily."

"Would you kill for her, _Doctor_?" The female hissed, stepping forward. "Would you make me bleed?"

"In a heartbeat."

Back in the shadows, TK inched towards the office door. It was empty now. All the uninjured koronkights had come out. Maybe if she could get through the door she could find a sound system, use a broadcast to rouse the gorphins.

"What about the human?" The koronkight asked. "Would make me die for her?"

"Leave her alone," the Doctor bit out.

"Not so strong for her, eh?"

"She's a hitch-hiker - she's not meant to be here -"

"Always bringing them right into danger, you," she hissed softly, motioning for a group of koronkights to take hold of him.

Turning on her heels, the koronkight marched back into the office before TK could make it to the door. She motioned for her guards to drag the Doctor in behind her, though he didn't put up much of a fight.

TK's heart beat frantically as she watched the doors slam shut behind the small army of koronkights. What would they do to him? He had rescued her from an inevitably slow and painful death on the dying planet earth. He had intended to show her the stars, and now...because the TARDIS had thrown a fit, they hadn't seen much other than pain and more dying planets.

She wasn't going to let him die until she got to see the stars with him.

"At least we know bullets kill them," murmured Viv somewhere amid the beakers. "I wonder what else will do them in?"


End file.
